Opinion ID: 789453
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Connecticut second-degree forgery is an offense relating to ... forgery under the INA

Text: 7 Section 237 of the INA, 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(2)(A)(iii), authorizes the removal of aliens who have committed an aggravated felony, as defined at 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(43). Subparagraph (R) of § 1101(a)(43) includes any offense relating to ... forgery ... for which the term of imprisonment is at least one year. In determining whether a given state conviction constitutes an aggravated felony under the INA, we do not look to the facts surrounding the particular conviction, but rather take a categorical approach, examining the generic elements of the offense of conviction to determine whether it is any broader than an offense defined as an `aggravated felony' under federal law. Gousse v. Ashcroft, 339 F.3d 91, 95-96 (2d Cir.2003) (some internal quotation marks omitted); see also Jobson v. Ashcroft, 326 F.3d 367, 371-72 (2d Cir.2003). If the criminal statute punishes conduct that falls outside the INA's definition, then the crime does not constitute an aggravated felony. Gousse, 339 F.3d at 96. Applying this categorical approach, Richards argues that Connecticut General Statute § 53a-139 is broader than the federal definition of forgery because it penalizes the mere possession, as opposed to the making or uttering, of a forged instrument. 8 Section 53a-139 provides, in relevant part, that [a] person is guilty of forgery in the second degree when, with intent to defraud, deceive, or injure another, he falsely makes, completes or alters a [specified] written instrument or issues or possesses any [such] written instrument which he knows to be forged. Conn. Gen.Stat. § 53a-139. The fact that Connecticut punishes a given act under the rubric of forgery is not dispositive of whether a conviction under that statute is an offense relating to ... forgery under the federal definition; absent clear evidence to the contrary, we presume that Congress did not intend the meaning of the INA to hinge on state law. See Sui, 250 F.3d at 114 (citing Drakes v. Zimski, 240 F.3d 246, 248 (3d Cir.2001)) (holding that [t]he language of [the INA] must be construed to have the meaning intended by Congress, not the [state] legislature). There is no readily available federal definition of forgery or an offense relating to ... forgery, however. The terms are not defined at § 1101(a)(43)(R) or elsewhere in the INA; so far as we are aware, the BIA has not settled on a general interpretation of either of these terms as employed at § 1101(a)(43). 3 Nor, as the Third Circuit observed in Drakes, has Congress defined the term forgery in any of the numerous criminal statutes in which the term appears. See Drakes, 240 F.3d at 249 (reviewing federal statutes addressing forgery). 9 In general, when a federal statute uses, but does not define, a term of art that carries an established common law meaning, we will give that term its common law definition (unless, again, Congress has clearly evinced intent to the contrary). Moskal v. United States, 498 U.S. 103, 114, 111 S.Ct. 461, 112 L.Ed.2d 449 (1990); Gilbert v. United States, 370 U.S. 650, 655, 82 S.Ct. 1399, 8 L.Ed.2d 750 (1962); see, e.g., Drakes, 240 F.3d at 249 (examining common law definition of forgery for the purpose of determining whether Delaware statute constituted an offense relating to ... forgery under § 1101(a)(43)(R)). The sparse case law discussing the scope of forgery at common law tends to support Richards' contention that forgery itself requires a false making. Gilbert, 370 U.S. at 656, 82 S.Ct. 1399 (internal quotation and citation omitted); see also United States v. McGovern, 661 F.2d 27, 29 (3d Cir.1981) (Common law forgery has three elements: (a) The false making or material alteration (b) with intent to defraud (c) of a writing which, if genuine, might be of legal efficacy.); United States v. Maybury, 274 F.2d 899, 903 (2d Cir.1960) (noting that an essential element of the crime of forgery is making the false writing); accord 36 Am.Jur.2d Forgery § 1 (2001) (defining forgery as the fraudulent making or alteration of a writing to the prejudice of another's rights); 37 C.J.S. Forgery § 2 (1997) (defining forgery as the false making or materially altering ... of any writing). In addition, the Model Penal Code, to which we have also referred for definitions of terms that the INA does not define, see Sui, 250 F.3d at 115, does not define forgery to include possessory offenses. Model Penal Code § 224.1 (1980). 10 Thus, if subparagraph (R) defined aggravated felony to include only forgery offenses, Richards' argument would present a close question. But the aggravated felony definition encompasses offense[s] relating to ... forgery. 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(43)(R). In Kamagate v. Ashcroft, decided subsequent to the district court's decision and the briefing of this appeal, we considered whether conviction under a federal counterfeiting statute for possession of counterfeit securities was an offense relating to counterfeiting under subparagraph (R). 385 F.3d at 153-56. In holding that § 1101(a)(43)(R) encompassed the possessory crime, we rejected a narrow interpretation of the term relating to under which it would reach only crimes involving counterfeiting itself. Id. In particular, we relied on the Supreme Court's analysis of the term relating to in Morales v. Trans World Airlines, Inc., 504 U.S. 374, 383, 112 S.Ct. 2031, 119 L.Ed.2d 157 (1992), in which the Court observed that Black's Law Dictionary defines the words expansively: `to stand in some relation; to have bearing or concern; to pertain; refer; to bring into association with or connection with.' Kamagate, 385 F.3d at 154 (quoting Morales, 504 U.S. at 383, 112 S.Ct. 2031 (quoting Black's Law Dictionary 1158 (5th ed.1979)) (further internal quotation marks omitted)). We also looked to the BIA's interpretation of the phrase relating to a controlled substance in the predecessor statute to 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(2)(B)(I). Id. (citing In re Beltran, 20 I. & N. Dec. 521, 525-26 (BIA 1992) ([T]he phrase `relating to' ... has long been construed to have broad coverage.... Congress intended to give inclusive meaning in the immigration laws to the phrase `relating to.')). Finally, we indicated our agreement with the Ninth Circuit's conclusion in Albillo-Figueroa v. INS, 221 F.3d 1070, 1073 (9th Cir.2000), that the inclusion of the term relating to in subsection (R) `necessarily' signaled Congress's intent to cover `a range of activities beyond those of counterfeiting or forgery itself,' including those activities made illegal in order to discourage counterfeiting or forgery `through the criminalization of the use of [their] end product [s].' Kamagate, 385 F.3d at 155 (quoting Albillo-Figueroa, 221 F.3d at 1073). 11 The analysis in Kamagate controls the result here: Criminalization of possession of forged instruments with the intent to deceive, defraud or injure, like possession of counterfeit instruments with similar intent, discourages the underlying crime. Cf. 18 U.S.C. §§ 477, 480 (criminalizing possession of specified forged instruments); Cal.Penal Code § 475 (same); Del.Code Ann. tit. 11, § 861 (same); Idaho Code § 18-3603 (same); Me.Rev.Stat. Ann. tit. 17-A § 703 (same). Even if possession of a forged instrument with intent to defraud, deceive or injure is not forgery as defined at common law, it is unarguably an offense relating to forgery within the broad construction we have given that term. 4 See Kamagate, 385 F.3d at 154-56; see also Drakes, 240 F.3d at 250 (reaching the same conclusion with respect to a materially identical Delaware statute). We therefore hold that Connecticut General Statute § 53a-139 punishes only conduct that is covered by 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(43)(R), and that a conviction under this statute for which a sentence of one year or more is imposed constitutes an aggravated felony.