Source: http://blog.mikebakerlaw.com/2011/03/
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 20:34:14+00:00

Document:
The Board of Immigration Appeals held in Matter of Sesay, 25 I & N Dec. 431 (Mar. 17, 2011) that (1) under INA § 245(d) [8 USCA § 1255(d)] (2006), a fiancé(e) visa holder can only adjust status based on the marriage to the fiancé(e) petitioner (Matter of Zampetis, 14 I. & N. Dec. 125 (Reg. Comm'r 1972), superseded), (2) a fiancé(e) visa holder whose bona fide marriage to the fiancé(e) visa petitioner is more than two years old at the time when the adjustment application is adjudicated is not subject to the provisions for conditional resident status under INA § 216 [ 8 USCA § 1186a] (2006), (3) a fiancé(e) visa holder satisfies the visa eligibility and visa availability requirements of INA § 245(a) [8 USCA § 1255(a)] on the date when he or she is admitted to U.S. as a K-1 nonimmigrant provided that the fiancé(e) enters into a bona fide marriage with the fiancé(e) petitioner within 90 days, (4) a fiancé(e) visa holder may be granted adjustment of status under INA § 245(a) and (d) even if the marriage to the fiancé(e) visa petitioner does not exist at the time when the adjustment application is adjudicated if the applicant can demonstrate that he or she entered into a bona fide marriage within the 90-day period to the fiancé(e) visa petition.
The BIA held that an alien who enters on a K-1 visa and timely enters into a bona fide marriage with the petitioning spouse, remains eligible to adjust status under INA §245(a) despite termination of the marriage. Matter of Sesay, 25 I&N Dec. 431 (BIA 2011) AILA Doc. No. 11032262.
The respondent, a native and citizen of Sierra Leone, met his future United States citizen wife in 1997 when they were both studying in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. She filed a Petition for Alien Fiancé(e) (Form I-129F) on the respondent’s behalf, which was approved by the former Immigration and Naturalization Service (“INS”)1 on October 27, 1999. The respondent was issued a K-1 nonimmigrant fiancé visa pursuant to section 101(a)(15)(K)(i) of the Act, 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(15)(K)(i) (2000), on February 4, 2000. On April 18, 2000, the respondent was admitted to the United States as a fiancé for a 90-day period. He married the fiancée petitioner on April 28, 2000. The couple had a son, born March 29, 2001. On June 20, 2001, the respondent filed an adjustment of status application with the INS.
On November 8, 2002, the INS mistakenly denied the respondent’s adjustment application because it had not adjudicated the application within 2 years of his April 28, 2000, marriage. The couple divorced on June 5, 2003. In a Notice to Appear dated October 29, 2003, the Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”) alleged that the respondent was in the United States in violation of law pursuant to section 237(a)(1)(B) of the Act, 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(1)(B) (2000). On November 24, 2004, the respondent married his current United States citizen spouse. She filed a family-based immigrant visa petition, Form I-130 (Petition for Alien Relative), on the respondent’s behalf, which the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (“USCIS”) approved on July 26, 2005.
In removal proceedings, the respondent conceded removability and sought to renew his adjustment application based on the approved fiancé petition filed by his first wife. He also filed an adjustment application based on the approved I-130 filed by his current wife. In a decision dated April 24, 2007, the Immigration Judge denied both adjustment applications. He denied adjustment based on the approved I-130 filed by the second wife because the respondent, having been admitted on a fiancé visa, could only adjust status as a result of the marriage to the fiancée petitioner. The Immigration Judge denied the adjustment application based on the first marriage for lack of jurisdiction because the respondent was no longer married to the fiancée petitioner. The respondent has appealed from the Immigration Judge’s decision.
The respondent now concedes that he cannot adjust status based on the I-130 visa petition filed by his second wife. We agree, because the language of section 245(d) of the Act clearly precludes fiancé(e)s from adjusting status on any basis other than marriage to the fiancé(e) petitioner. See Markovski v. Gonzales, 486 F.3d 108, 110 (4th Cir. 2007) (stating that the language of section 245(d) of the Act is clear insofar as it bars K-1 visa holders from adjusting status on any basis other than marriage to the fiancé(e) petitioner); see also Kalal v. Gonzales, 402 F.3d 948, 951 (9th Cir. 2005) (same).
On appeal, the DHS acknowledges that the INS improperly denied the respondent’s adjustment application in 2002, because there is no requirement that a fiancé(e) adjust status within 2 years of the marriage. We agree with the parties that the Immigration Judge has jurisdiction to adjudicate the renewal of the respondent’s fiancé adjustment application under section 245(a) of the Act in removal proceedings. See 8 C.F.R. §§ 245.2(c), 1245.2(c) (2010).
K-1/AOS- marriage terminated at time of adjustment of status.
A fiancé(e) visa holder satisfies the visa eligibility and visa availability requirements ofsection 245(a) of the Act on the date he or she is admitted to the United States as a K-1 nonimmigrant, provided that the fiancé(e) enters into a bona fide marriage with the fiancé(e) petitioner within 90 days. Therefore, a fiancé(e) visa holder may be granted adjustment of status under sections 245(a) and(d) of the Act, even if the marriage to the fiancé(e) visa petitioner does not exist at the time that the adjustment application is adjudicated, if the applicant can demonstrate that s/he entered into bona fide a marriage within the 90-day period to the fiancé visa petitioner. Consistent with Choin v. Mukasey, 537 F.3d 1116 (9th Cir. 2008).
Here, the respondent completed the required steps in the fiancé adjustment process. He was not subject to the provisions of section 216 because his marriage was more than 2 years old when his adjustment application was adjudicated. He established his prima-facie eligibility for adjustment of status based on his marriage to the fiancé(e) petitioner. The respondent seeks to renew his adjustment application premised on his first marriage, which the INS improperly denied. Thee respondent’s divorce from the fiancé(e) petitioner does not render him ineligible for adjustment of status under sections 245(a) and (d) of the Act.
Holding: A statement given to police by a wounded crime victim identifying the person who shot him may be admitted as evidence at the trial if the victim dies before trial and thus does not appear. The Court concluded that because the primary purpose of the interrogation was to enable police to deal with an ongoing emergency, the statements resulting from that interrogation were not testimonial and could be admitted without violating the Confrontation Clause.
Held: Covington’s identification and description of the shooter and the location of the shooting were not testimonial statements because they had a “primary purpose . . . to enable police assistance to meet an on-going emergency.” Davis, 547 U. S., at 822. Therefore, their admission at Bryant’s trial did not violate the Confrontation Clause. Pp. 532.
68. Crawford did not “spell out a comprehensive definition of ‘testimonial,’ ” but it noted that testimonial evidence includes, among other things, “police interrogations.” Ibid. Thus, Sylvia Crawford’s statements during a station-house interrogation about a stabbing were testimonial, and their admission when her husband, the accused, had “no opportunity” for cross-examination due to spousal privilege made out a Sixth Amendment violation. In Davis and Hammon, both domestic violence cases, the Court explained that“[s]tatements are non testimonial when made in the course of police interrogation under circumstances objectively indicating that the [interrogation’s] primary purpose . . . is to enable police assistance to meet an ongoing emergency,” but they “are testimonial when the circumstances objectively indicate that there is no such ongoing emergency, and that the [interrogation’s] primary purpose is to establish or prove past events potentially relevant to later criminal prosecution.” 547 U. S., at 822. Thus, a recording of a 911 call describing an ongoing domestic disturbance was non testimonial in Davis, where the victim’s “elicited statements were necessary to be able to resolve [the ongoing] emergency,” and the statements were not formal. Id., at 827. But the statements in Hammon were testimonial, where the victim was interviewed after the event in a room separate from her husband and “deliberately recounted, in response to police question-ing” the past events. Id., at 830. Here, the context is a non domestic dispute, with the “ongoing emergency” extending beyond an initial victim to a potential threat to the responding police and the public.This context requires additional clarification of what Davis meant by “the primary purpose of the interrogation is to enable police assistance to meet an ongoing emergency.” Id., at 822. Pp. 5–12.
(b) To make the “primary purpose” determination, the Court must objectively evaluate the circumstances in which the encounter be-tween the individual and the police occurs and the parties’ statements and actions. Pp. 12–23.
(1) The primary purpose inquiry is objective. The circumstances in which an encounter occurs—e.g., at or near a crime scene versus at a police station, during an ongoing emergency or afterwards—are clearly matters of objective fact. And the relevant inquiry into the parties’ statements and actions is not the subjective or actual purpose of the particular parties, but the purpose that reasonable participants would have had, as ascertained from the parties’ statements and actions and the circumstances in which the encounter occurred.
830. An emergency focuses the participants not on “prov[ing] past events potentially relevant to later criminal prosecution,” id., at 822, but on “end[ing] a threatening situation,” id., at 832. The Michigan Supreme Court failed to appreciate that whether an emergency exists and is ongoing is a highly context-dependent inquiry. An assessment of whether an emergency threatening the police and public is ongoing cannot narrowly focus on whether the threat to the first victim has been neutralized because the threat to the first responders and public may continue. The State Supreme Court also did not appreciate that an emergency’s duration and scope may depend in part on the type of weapon involved; the court below relied on Davis and Hammon, where the assailants used their fists, as controlling the scope of an emergency involving a gun. A victim’s medical condition is important to the primary purpose inquiry to the extent that it sheds light on the victim’s ability to have any purpose at all in responding to police questions and on the likelihood that any such purpose would be a testimonial one. It also provides important context for first responders to judge the existence and magnitude of a continuing threat to the victim, themselves, and the public. This does not mean that an emergency lasts the entire time that a perpetrator is on the loose, but trial courts can determine in the first instance when an interrogation transitions from non testimonial to testimonial. Finally, whether an ongoing emergency exists is simply one factor informing the ultimate inquiry regarding an interrogation’s “primary purpose.” Another is the encounter’s informality. Formality suggests the absence of an emergency, but informality does not necessarily indicate the presence of an emergency or the lack of testimonial intent. The facts here— the questioning occurred in an exposed, public area, before emergency medical services arrived, and in a disorganized fashion— distinguish this case from Crawford’s formal station-house interrogtion. Pp. 14–20.

References: § 245
 § 1255
 § 216
 § 1186
 § 245
 § 1255
 § 245
 §245
 § 1101
 § 1227
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