Opinion ID: 202683
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Res Judicata Claim Time-Barred

Text: 11 Fontes argues first that his deportation order is barred by res judicata. The government responds that we may not consider this argument because Fontes did not petition this court in a timely manner, i.e., within 30 days of September 30, 2004, for review of the Board's decision denying the res judicata challenge and dismissing his appeal. Under the current statutory framework, petitions to review in this court must be brought within 30 days of the dates of final orders of removal. 8 U.S.C. § 1252(b)(1); see Ishak v. Gonzales, 422 F.3d 22, 29 (1st Cir.2005) (removal order final after dismissal of appeal). This time limit is a `strict jurisdictional requirement.' Ven v. Ashcroft, 386 F.3d 357, 359 (1st Cir.2004) (quoting Zhang v. INS, 348 F.3d 289, 293 (1st Cir.2003)). A motion to reopen or reconsider does not toll the period for filing a petition for review of an underlying order of deportation. Ven, 386 F.3d at 359. 12 Fontes responds that he is entitled to relief from the statutory 30-day time limitation because, on September 30, 2004, when the Board handed down its adverse ruling on res judicata and dismissed his administrative appeal, he had no legal remedy in our court for the bringing of a petition for review. 1 13 The short answer to Fontes's contention regarding the absence on September 30, 2004, and the following 30 days, of any review process in our court, is that Congress was under no obligation to have provided him with one. The fact that, effective May 11, 2005, Congress for the first time allowed criminal deportees in Fontes's shoes to file petitions for review in this court does not establish that Congress somehow intended to afford Fontes an earlier opportunity. See Stone v. INS, 514 U.S. 386, 405, 115 S.Ct. 1537, 131 L.Ed.2d 465 (1996) (Judicial review provisions . . . are jurisdictional in nature and must be construed with strict fidelity to their terms). Nothing in the statute or its history has been called to our attention warranting such an interpretation. Congress's power to fashion immigration procedures is virtually unlimited; only constitutional considerations, not present here, would warrant a court's overriding Congress's carefully-crafted review provisions. 14 Fontes seeks to avoid the above by comparing his situation with that arising in Rogers v. United States, 180 F.3d 349, 354 (1st Cir.1999). In that criminal case, we joined other circuits in holding that the district court properly adopted and applied an unwritten one-year grace period, running from the effective date of AEDPA, when reviewing the timeliness of Rogers' § 2255 motion to vacate his criminal conviction and sentence. Id. We quoted a Fourth Circuit case to the effect that, 15 When application of a new limitation period would wholly eliminate claims for substantive rights or remedial actions considered timely under the old law, the application is impermissibly retroactive. . . . The legislature cannot extinguish an existing cause of action by enacting a new limitation period without first providing a reasonable time after the effective date of the new limitation period in which to initiate the action. 16 Brown v. Angelone, 150 F.3d 370, 373 (4th Cir.1998) (citations omitted). 17 Purporting to rely on Rogers, Fontes asks us to establish a grace period of our own, running for 30 days from May 11, 2005, the effective date of the REAL ID Act of 2005 (RIDA), Pub.L. 109-13, Div. B, 119 Stat. 231, for him to have petitioned us for review. As his petition was, in fact, filed on May 20, 2005, this grace period would make timely his petition under RIDA. 18 As we have said above, however, Congress's authority to establish judicial review procedures in immigration matters is plenary, making it questionable to what extent the precedent in Rogers, a criminal case, would be controlling here. But we need not address that question since the present circumstances are unlike those in Rogers. Here, the RIDA 30-day limitation did not shorten an earlier, more extensive limitations period already applying to the same cause of action. To the contrary, Congress had previously forbidden review petitions to courts of appeals relative to deportation orders involving aliens removable for having committed criminal offenses; no such petitions were authorized until May 11, 2005, the effective date of RIDA. See note 1, supra. It follows that there was no prior more generous limitations period that might have misled Fontes into failing to act sooner. Prior to RIDA's enactment on May 11, 2005, Fontes could, to be sure, have sought review of his res judicata claim in the district court, seeking a quite different kind of federal process, habeas corpus. Mahadeo v. Reno, 226 F.3d 3, 8 (1st Cir.2000). The existence of that opportunity, of which Fontes did not avail himself, does not provide sufficient reason for this court, without Congressional authority, to create a grace period for him to seek a different kind of review in the courts of appeals subsequent to the enactment of RIDA. Especially is this so as Fontes had a liberal length of time, seven months (from September 30, 2004 to May 11, 2005), to have filed for habeas corpus in the district court had he so wished. Reasonable diligence would certainly have strongly suggested that he seek review within that ample period. Had he done so, his habeas petition would have been transferred after May 11, 2005, under RIDA's provisions, as a petition for review in this court. RIDA § 106(c). 2 Congress had understood that district court review proceedings might be in progress prior to the enactment of RIDA and had tailored a special provision to permit them to continue, after transfer, in the courts of appeal. Fontes was entitled to no more. We see no issue of fundamental fairness such as might warrant creating an additional grace period for the bringing of a review petition under RIDA, even assuming existence of the power to do so. 19 Enactment of RIDA terminated any opportunity for relief in the district court and, with no then-pending district court proceeding, Fontes's right to challenge his removal order in this court on res judicata grounds expired. See Chen v. Gonzales, 435 F.3d 788, 789 (7th Cir.2006) (a petition filed in the district court after RIDA was enacted can neither be entertained nor transferred). In the circumstances, we are presently without jurisdiction to review Fontes's res judicata claim.