Source: https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F3/119/106/486265/
Timestamp: 2019-12-16 13:27:29
Document Index: 539607464

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 701', '§ 1151', '§ 204', '§ 1361', '§ 706', '§ 287']

Mary Nell Egan, Plaintiff-appellant, v. John Weiss, Officer in Charge, Ins, and the Department Ofjustice Board of Immigration Appeals, Defendants-appellees, 119 F.3d 106 (2d Cir. 1997) :: Justia
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Mary Nell Egan, Plaintiff-appellant, v. John Weiss, Officer in Charge, Ins, and the Department Ofjustice Board of Immigration Appeals, Defendants-appellees, 119 F.3d 106 (2d Cir. 1997)
US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit - 119 F.3d 106 (2d Cir. 1997) Argued April 28, 1997. Decided July 11, 1997
Before: KEARSE and CALABRESI, Circuit Judges, and OBERDORFER, District Judge* .
Plaintiff Mary Nell Egan, a United States citizen, appeals from a judgment of the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut, Janet Bond Arterton, Judge, dismissing her complaint seeking review under the Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. §§ 701-706 (1994), of a decision of the Immigration and Naturalization Service ("INS") Board of Immigration Appeals ("Board" or "BIA"), affirming the denial of her 1992 petition to classify her husband David Adebimpe, the beneficiary of the petition, as an "immediate relative" of a United States citizen pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1151(b) (2) (A) (i) (1994). The district court ruled that, in light of the past history of fraudulent submissions by Egan and Adebimpe in support of the petition, the Board's denial of the petition was not an abuse of discretion. Egan contends that the Board was required to accept the "confirmation" of the Oyo Local Government Grade 'C1' Customary Court in Nigeria ("Oyo court" or "customary court") that, prior to leaving Nigeria, Adebimpe had never been married. For the reasons stated below, we see no basis for overturning the decision of the district court.
A United States citizen who petitions to have an alien classified as her spouse is required to "provide evidence of the claimed relationship," including "a certificate of marriage issued by civil authorities, and proof of the legal termination of all previous marriages of both the petitioner and the beneficiary." 8 C.F.R. § 204.2(a) (2) (1997) (emphasis added). The burden of proving the claimed relationship is on the petitioner. See, e.g., 8 U.S.C. § 1361 (1994); Tongatapu Woodcraft Hawaii, Ltd. v. Feldman, 736 F.2d 1305, 1308 (9th Cir. 1984); Elatos Restaurant Corp. v. Sava, 632 F. Supp. 1049, 1053 (S.D.N.Y. 1986); Matter of Brantigan, 11 I & N Dec. 493 (BIA 1966). The Board's denial of a classification petition may be overturned only if it is arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law. See 5 U.S.C. § 706; North American Industries, Inc. v. Feldman, 722 F.2d 893, 898 (1st Cir. 1983); Mila v. District Director of the Denver, Colorado District of the Immigration & Naturalization Service, 678 F.2d 123, 125 (10th Cir. 1982), cert. denied, 459 U.S. 1104, 103 S. Ct. 726, 74 L. Ed. 2d 952 (1983); Kaliski v. District Director of Immigration & Naturalization Service, 620 F.2d 214, 216 n. 1 (9th Cir. 1980). "Appropriate deference must be accorded [the INS's] decisions" in light of the widespread fraud associated with immediate-relative petitions. INS v. Miranda, 459 U.S. 14, 18-19 & n. 4, 103 S. Ct. 281, 283-84 & n. 4, 74 L. Ed. 2d 12 (1982) (per curiam).
The INS district director denied Egan's petition, finding the affidavits not sufficiently supported by other evidence to give them significant probative value. On appeal, the Board agreed with the district director that the affidavits were self-serving and should be given little weight. The BIA also considered the decree of the Oyo court but found that it appeared to rest on nothing more than the affidavit of Adebimpe's father. The Board stated that it was not required to give full faith and credit to that decree, noting, inter alia, that a "foreign judgment [ ] may not be accepted by the courts where the proceedings underlying that judgment may have been conducive to fraud or collusion, even though the propriety of the judgment itself is not in question." BIA Decision dated May 17, 1996. The Board concluded that Egan had not carried her burden of establishing eligibility for the classification requested and noted that any ambiguity in the record had been caused by the prior fraudulent statements submitted by Egan and Adebimpe. Against this background, we find no merit in the contention that the Board was required to accept the truth of the self-serving statements contained in the various affidavits submitted by Egan, Adebimpe, and Adebimpe's family members.
Nor was the Board required, in the circumstances, to accept the truth of the assertions "confirm [ed]" in the Oyo customary court order. That order was not obtained as a result of an adjudication or any independent investigation by the court into Adebimpe's marital status, but rather was functionally more akin to a court notarization of an affiant's attestation to a given fact, without any assessment of the affiant's credibility. The decree states simply that the "court believes the contents stated" in the affidavit of Adebimpe's father "since the applicant ... himself signed the affidavit before the Commissioner for Oaths." Egan submitted this decree only after a divorce decree purportedly from the Ikeja customary court, as to which Egan had not submitted a Foreign Service Officer's certification of genuineness as required by 8 C.F.R. § 287.6, was determined to be fraudulent by the INS, a determination later conceded by Egan and Adebimpe. In submitting the Oyo court's order, Egan again failed to submit the requisite certificate of genuineness. That failure, combined with the long history of fraudulent misrepresentations by Egan and Adebimpe, persuades us that the Board did not abuse its discretion in declining to accept the Oyo court's order as binding.