Opinion ID: 794361
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Relevant Federal and State Statutes

Text: 12 A brief review of the statutes relevant to this appeal is useful to our discussion of the merits of Vargas's legal challenge.
13 INA § 237(a)(2)(A)(iii) states that [a]ny alien who is convicted of an aggravated felony at any time after admission is deportable. 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(2)(A)(iii). INA § 101(a)(43) includes a variety of crimes within its statutory definition of aggravated felony, including, but by no means limited to, murder, rape, drug trafficking, firearms trafficking, and money laundering. See 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(43). Also included within the definition of aggravated felony is any crime of violence (as defined in section 16 of Title 18, but not including a purely political offense) for which the term of imprisonment [is] at least one year. Id. § 1101(a)(43)(F).
14 Section 16 of Title 18 offers two definitions of crime of violence: 15 (a) an offense that has as an element the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force against the person or property of another, or 16 (b) any other offense that is a felony and that, by its nature, involves a substantial risk that physical force against the person or property of another may be used in the course of committing the offense. 17 18 U.S.C. § 16. Because the BIA ruled that Vargas's first-degree manslaughter conviction qualified as a crime of violence under § 16(b), we focus on that subsection in this opinion.
18 New York Penal Law § 125.20 identifies four distinct circumstances in which a person commits manslaughter in the first degree: when 1. With intent to cause serious physical injury to another person, he causes the death of such person or of a third person; or 19 2. With intent to cause the death of another person, he causes the death of such person or of a third person under circumstances which do not constitute murder because he acts under the influence of extreme emotional disturbance, as defined in paragraph (a) of subdivision one of section 125.25. The fact that homicide was committed under the influence of extreme emotional disturbance constitutes a mitigating circumstance reducing murder to manslaughter in the first degree and need not be proved in any prosecution initiated under this subdivision; or 20 3. He commits upon a female pregnant for more than twenty-four weeks an abortional act which causes her death, unless such abortional act is justifiable pursuant to subdivision three of section 125.05; or 21 4. Being eighteen years old or more and with intent to cause physical injury to a person less than eleven years old, the defendant recklessly engages in conduct which creates a grave risk of serious physical injury to such person and thereby causes the death of such person. 22 N.Y. Penal Law § 125.20. 23 Serious physical injury, as referenced in subsection (1) of § 125.20, is defined by New York law as physical injury which creates a substantial risk of death, or which causes death or serious and protracted disfigurement, protracted impairment of health or protracted loss or impairment of the function of any bodily organ. N.Y. Penal Law § 10.00(10). 24 Extreme emotional disturbance, as referenced in subsection (2) of § 125.20, is a partial affirmative defense to second-degree murder that is available where [t]he defendant acted under the influence of extreme emotional disturbance for which there was a reasonable explanation or excuse. Id. § 125.25(1)(a); see People v. White, 79 N.Y.2d 900, 903, 581 N.Y.S.2d 651, 652-53, 590 N.E.2d 236 (1992) (describing components of extreme emotional disturbance defense as (1) objective element requiring proof that there was reasonable explanation or excuse; and (2) subjective element requiring proof that conduct was influenced by extreme emotional disturbance at time crime was committed). If a defendant charged with second-degree murder proves extreme emotional disturbance by a preponderance of the evidence, he is not acquitted; rather, the charge of conviction is reduced from murder to manslaughter in the first degree. See DeLuca v. Lord, 77 F.3d 578, 585 (2d Cir.1996) (citing People v. Casassa, 49 N.Y.2d 668, 675, 427 N.Y.S.2d 769, 772-73, 404 N.E.2d 1310 (1980)). 25