The Associated Press State & Local Wire
February 7, 2005, Monday, BC cycle
Las Vegas deportation case illustrates mixed-family issue
LAS VEGAS
An appeals court ruling has given a southern Nevada family hope they
can win an immigration case and avoid deportation to Mexico.
A lawyer representing Luz Maria Medrano and her family said the
decision by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco
could set a precedent for families with some members born in the U.S.
or who have become U.S. citizens.
The family’s case hinges in part on the status of 6-year-old Angel
Bacilio, who was born in the U.S. and is the only member of the
family in the country legally.
An immigration law expert at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas Boyd
School of Law said the case illustrates the complexity of immigration
cases involving families with some legal residents and others who are
not.
“Someone born here has citizenship, but can’t sponsor a parent or
family members until he or she is over 21 years old,” said David
Thronson, co-director of the UNLV immigration law clinic.
The new Mexican consul in Las Vegas, Mariano Lemus Gas, said the
issue of mixed-status families facing deportation should be dealt
with uniformly rather than case-by-case.
He said he believes American immigration law should be reformed to
balance industry’s need for immigrant labor with workers’ rights and
dignity.
Lemus Gas said he was tracking about 16 immigration reform
initiatives in Congress.
“I hope your Congress can approve at least some of them,” he said.
When the family appeared before U.S. Immigration Court Judge Harry
Gastley in November, they argued they should be allowed to remain in
the U.S. because Angel has learning disabilities and needs special
therapy. It would be a hardship for him to leave to Mexico should his
parents and older brother be deported, they said.
The judge held that Angel could adapt to life in Mexico and his
condition did not constitute a hardship under the law, Gastley said.
The family – Medrano, 39, Angel Bacilio-Gutierrez, 33, Demian
Martinez-Medrano, 16, and Bacilio, 6 – is now represented by Las
Vegas lawyer Leon Rosen, 81.
Rosen said the appeals court’s Jan. 26 ruling opens discussion about
whether an attorney should be assigned in all deportation cases, like
in criminal matters.
Federal law currently classifies deportation as a civil matter, where
people have a right to an attorney but aren’t guaranteed one.
Medrano, a Mexican immigrant, was divorced, desperate and destitute
when she entered the U.S. illegally with her son, Demian, about 1990.
She made her way to Chicago, where she lived with an uncle and worked
in restaurants before moving to Las Vegas in 1997.
She met her husband, Angel Bacilio-Gutierrez, 33, a Mexican immigrant
who had entered the country illegally when he was 14. She studied
English and real estate, and now works in a real estate agent’s
office.
Demian, who has spent almost all of his life in America, told the Las
Vegas Review-Journal he thinks of himself as an American.
“I go to movies, go bowling, go to school and stuff,” he said. “This
all of a sudden makes me feel like an outsider.”
Las Vegas had another case recently in which two girls were rescued
from deportation to Armenia when U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security
Tom Ridge intervened at the behest of Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev.
Thronson said U.S. authorities increasingly face complex immigration
cases involving families of mixed status.
A recent study by the Urban Institute, a social policy research
group, found 85 percent of families led by non-citizens have members
of mixed status.
Thronson said the Medrano family’s best chance will be to prove they
have lived here more than 10 years, are of good moral character, have
no convictions and would face exceptional and unusual hardship if
deported.
“Saying that life would be harder or that they’d lose opportunities
(in Mexico) isn’t going to be enough,” Thronson said. “But if they
can establish there’s a disability or a need for medical care, that
could do it.”
Bacilio-Gutierrez said he fears the worst if his family loses its
appeal.
“If they send us to Mexico, this whole family is going to be
destroyed,” he said.