Court Opinion

ID: 9473803
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 04:40:03.47178+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:43:43.663025
License: Public Domain

VANCE, Circuit Judge,
concurring in result:
I concur in the result reached by my colleagues in vacating the injunctive relief granted by the district court, but I would do so by reaching the merits of petitioners’ claims. In concluding that in this instance the INS district director lacked authority to grant a stay of deportation, my colleagues are effectively holding that the Attorney General, himself, was without authority to stay these deportations. I cannot agree with this holding.
By 8 C.F.R. § 237.1, the Attorney General has delegated all his authority under 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a) to the district director. Section 1227(a) empowers the Attorney General to stay deportation of an excludable alien whenever he concludes that “immediate deportation is not practicable or proper.” (emphasis added). This plenary grant of authority from Congress to the Attorney General makes no mention of any specific factors that the Attorney General is to consider when determining whether immediate deportation is proper. To narrowly construe this broad delegation of authority as allowing the Attorney General or his delegated agent, the district director, to stay deportations under section 1227(a) only when suitable transportation cannot be arranged, seems totally inconsistent with this court’s previous decisions recognizing the broad authority granted the Attorney General in immigration matters. See Garcia-Mir v. Smith, 766 F.2d 1478, 1484 (11th Cir.1985); Jean v. Nelson, 727 F.2d 957, 975-79 (11th Cir.1984), aff'd., — U.S. -, 105 S.Ct. 2992, 86 L.Ed.2d 664 (1985). Because 8 C.F.R. § 237.1 empowers the district director to entertain motions for stays of deportation under circumstances such as these, I consider the merits of petitioners’ claims.
The district court’s orders enjoin the government from deporting any of the forty-four excludable aliens who are the petitioners in these cases. By its April 24 and 25, 1985 orders 1 the district court certified the following two controlling questions of law for interlocutory appeal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b):
(1) Does 8 U.S.C. § 1253(h)(2)(B) contemplate two separate findings; namely, that the alien has been convicted of a “particularly serious crime” and that he “constitutes a danger to the community?”
(2) Is a mere “parroting” of 8 U.S.C. § 1253(h)(2)(B) or (C) by the District Director or the BIA sufficient under the abuse of discretion standard or do these officials have to make subsidiary findings of fact which support their legal conclusions?
*1221The petitioners in these cases are presently incarcerated in the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary. They are excludable aliens who have been notified by the government that their deportation to Cuba is imminent. They all have motions to reopen their orders of exclusion to consider their asylum claims now pending before the INS.2 After their requests for stays of deportation were denied by the district director, they filed individual petitions for writs of habeas corpus in district court.
The district director denied the motions for stays of deportation because he determined that no petitioner had shown a realistic likelihood of success on his motion to reopen his exclusion order. In reaching this conclusion the district director determined that each of the excludable aliens was ineligible for asylum or withholding of deportation because of his prior criminal conduct. See 8 U.S.C. §§ 1253(h)(2)(B) & (C). The district court granted the temporary restraining orders because it found that the forty-four petitioners had shown a substantial likelihood of success on the merits of their claim that the district director abused his discretion in finding them ineligible for asylum under either 8 U.S.C. § 1253(h)(2)(B) or § 1253(h)(2)(C). Specifically, the district court found it likely that the district director had abused his discretion by: (1) failing to make separate findings, pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1253(h)(2)(B), that an alien had been convicted of a particularly serious crime in the United States and that he constituted a danger to the community; and (2) failing to make sufficient subsidiary findings of fact to support his legal conclusions that the aliens had either committed a particularly serious crime in the United States or had committed a serious non-political crime prior to entering the United States.
A stay of deportation is a form of relief which the Attorney General may grant or deny an excludable alien at his discretion. By regulation, the Attorney General has delegated his authority to grant stays of deportation to the local district director. 8 C.F.R. § 237.1. In immigration matters, this court has long recognized that when reviewing the administrative denial of a discretionary form of relief “[t]he inquiry goes to the question whether or not there has been an exercise of administrative discretion and, if so, whether or not the manner of exercise has been arbitrary or capricious.” Chokloikaew v. INS, 601 F.2d 216, 218 (5th Cir.1979) (quoting Paul v. INS, 521 F.2d 194, 197 (5th Cir.1975)). See generally Jean v. Nelson, 727 F.2d at 975-79 (discussing the extremely limited scope of judicial review in matters of immigration that have been committed solely to the discretion of executive officials). Judicial inquiry therefore is limited here to whether the district director acted arbitrarily and capriciously in concluding that the petitioners. had no real likelihood of succeeding on their motions to reopen their orders of exclusion and in denying the motions for stays of deportation.
The first question certified by the district court pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b) is:
Does 8 U.S.C. § 1253(h)(2)(B) contemplate two separate findings; namely, that the alien has been convicted of a “particularly serious crime” and that he “constitutes a danger to the community?”
The district court concluded that the statute required separate determinations as to whether the petitioner had been convicted of a particularly serious crime and whether he constituted a danger to the community. The government argues that the statute does not require a separate determination that the petitioner is a danger to the community if the district director determines that he has been convicted of a particularly serious crime. In forty-one of the forty-four petitions now before us, the district director found that the petitioner had been convicted of a particularly serious crime in the United States but made no separate *1222finding as to whether the petitioner constituted a danger to the community.3
After examining the language used in the statute, I conclude that it does not require a district director to make a separate finding that the alien constitutes a danger to the community after the director determines that an alien has been convicted of a particularly serious crime. In pertinent part, section 1253(h)(2)(B) provides that the asylum or withholding of deportation provisions of section 1253(h)(1) shall not apply to any alien if the Attorney General determines that “the alien, having been convicted by a final judgment of a particularly serious crime, constitutes a danger to the community of the United States;.... ” As with all questions of statutory interpretation, we first look to the plain meaning of the language used in the statute. See United States v. Martino, 681 F.2d 952, 954 (5th Cir.1982) (en banc), aff'd, 464 U.S. 16, 104 S.Ct. 296, 78 L.Ed.2d 17 (1983). It seems plain that the statute, on its face, does not contemplate two separate findings. If Congress had intended that the director make two separate findings, it could have easily manifested its intent by simply connecting the two clauses with the conjunction “and.” Instead, the grammatical construction creates a cause and effect relationship between the clauses which indicates that conviction of a particularly serious crime is the sole factor that Congress has made determinative of whether the alien constitutes a danger to the community. The legislative history of section 1253(h)(2)(B) also supports this interpretation. Under the Refugee Act of 1980, section 1253(h) was amended to conform with Article 33 of the Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees (“Protocol”).4 See INS v. Stevic, — U.S. —, 104 S.Ct. 2489, 2496-97, 81 L.Ed.2d 321 (1984). Article 33 of the Protocol, known as the nonrefoulment provision, prohibits expelling or returning a refugee to a territory where his life would be threatened. According to the House Judiciary Committee Report, the amended version of section 1253(h) would prohibit those aliens “who have been convicted of particularly serious crimes which make them a danger to the community of the United States” from obtaining asylum or withholding of deportation. H.R.Rep. No. 608, 96th Cong., 1st Sess. 18 (1979).5 The clear implication of this language is that conviction of a particularly serious crime makes an alien a danger to the community. This is consistent with the interpretation given Article 33 of the Convention and Protocol by Other commentators. See N. Robinson, Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees: Its History, Contents and Interpretation 29 (Institute of Jewish Affairs 1953); Note, The Right of Asylum Under United States Law, 80 Colum.L.Rev. 1125, 1127 (1980). Since the language of the statute and its legislative history indicate that Congress never meant to require separate determinations of conviction of a particularly serious crime and dangerousness to the community under section 1253(h)(2)(B), the district court erred in holding to the contrary.
This conclusion is further bolstered by consideration of the practical problems that would arise if the district director were required to make a specific determination of an alien’s dangerousness. A separate determination of an alien’s potential dangerousness would require a prediction as to an alien’s potential for recidivism and *1223would lead to extensive, drawn-out hearings complete with psychological evaluations and expert testimony. Congress certainly was aware of these potential problems and its failure to address them suggests that it did not intend to burden stays of deportation hearings involving excludable aliens with such complexities.
The district court also certified the following question:
Is a mere “parroting” of 8 U.S.C. § 1253(h)(2)(B) or (C) by the District Director or the BIA sufficient under the abuse of discretion standard or do these officials have to make subsidiary findings of fact which support their legal conclusions?
To reiterate, the appropriate standard for judicial review of a denial of a stay of deportation is whether the Attorney General through the district director, has exercised his discretion arbitrarily or capriciously. A district director, therefore, need only make such findings of fact as are necessary to enable a court to determine whether he has acted arbitrarily or capriciously in denying the stay of deportation. From my reading of sections 1253(h)(2)(B) & (C) and the accompanying regulations, I do not conclude that the district director is required to make detailed subsidiary findings of fact to support his legal conclusions. See generally Overton Park v. Volpe, 401 U.S. 402, 409-417, 91 S.Ct. 814, 820-824, 28 L.Ed.2d 136 (1971) (administrative agency need not always accompany its decisions with formal findings of fact). While detailed subsidiary findings of fact would obviously assist the court in carrying out its review function, such detailed findings are neither required nor necessary in this instance. When administrative discretion is exercised findings are sufficient if the written decision of the administrative agency or the record of the administrative hearing sets out clearly the ground which forms the basis for the denial of the discretionary relief, so that a reviewing court is able to ascertain whether the decision is arbitrary or capricious. See Jarecha v. INS, 417 F.2d 220, 225 (5th Cir.1969). In each of the cases before the court, the district director has set out clearly the convictions which form the basis for his conclusion that the aliens will be ineligible for asylum under either 8 U.S.C. § 1253(h)(2)(B) or § 1253(h)(2)(C). His findings, therefore, are sufficient to enable a reviewing court to determine whether he has acted arbitrarily or capriciously in denying the stays of deportation.
A review of the record shows that the district director did not act arbitrarily or capriciously in finding that the petitioners had failed to demonstrate a likelihood of succeeding on their motions to reopen their exclusion orders. This finding is bolstered by his additional finding that all the petitioners had either been convicted of particularly serious crimes in the United States or had committed serious non-political crimes prior to entering the United States. The district director therefore did not act arbitrarily or capriciously in denying the motions for stays of deportation.

. I agree with the majority that the district court’s orders were preliminary injunctions reviewable under 28 U.S.C. § 1292(a)(1).

. At least some of the forty-four have had their motions to reopen, denied by an immigration judge, however, these decisions are now pending review before the Board of Immigration Appeals.

. The other three petitioners were found to have committed serious non-political crimes prior to their entry to the United States and thus were found ineligible for asylum pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1253(h)(2)(C). Dangerousness to the community is irrelevant under section 1253(h)(2)(C).

. 19 U.S.T. 6223, T.I.A.S. No. 6577, 606 U.N.T.S. 268 (1968). The Protocol incorporated by reference various provisions of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees ("Convention"), No. 2545, 189 U.N.T.S. 137 (July 28, 1951). Article 33 of the Protocol was taken directly from the Convention.

. Although an amended Senate version of the Refugee Act was passed in lieu of the House’s version, the Senate accepted the House’s section 1253(h) language with the understanding that it was based directly on the language of the Protocol. S.Conf.Rep., No. 590, 96th Cong., 2d Sess. 20 (1980), U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1980, p. 141.