I'm not assuming anything. I'm saying that if the facts or evidence presented show irrefutably that a person withheld required information to advance themselves, then there should be no limit as to how long they should be punished for it. I'm talking about something major like a criminal history, not a minor thing like cheating during a highschool exam, or a parking ticket you never paid.
Irvine, CA man may lose U.S. citizenship for lying in his N400
- Thread starter Feliz-LA
- Start date
I'm not assuming anything. I'm saying that if the facts or evidence presented show irrefutably that a person withheld required information to advance themselves, then there should be no limit as to how long they should be punished for it. I'm talking about something major like a criminal history, not a minor thing like cheating during a highschool exam, or a parking ticket you never paid.
Jackolantern
Registered Users (C)
But then what is "irrefutable"? How do you refute something 20 years after the alleged incident, when you no longer have evidence and witnesses available to support your case?
I can only agree with the lack of a statute of limitations on naturalization if there are carefully worded restrictions that would allow them to denaturalize indefinitely only in cases where it would be impossible for the defendant to save themselves even if the defendant could go back in time to gather all the evidence and witnesses they want.
In the case mentioned in this thread, it is an undisputed fact that he was convicted of various offenses and failed to disclose them; there was nothing the defendant could ever do to change that, even if the denaturalization proceedings began 1 day after his oath when all the evidence was still fresh. But if they want to denaturalize somebody because they supposedly lied about the length of their overseas trips prior to naturalization, or didn't pay a speeding ticket, or allegedly lied to the question "have you ever committed an offense for which you were not arrested", the person's ability to prove their position is greatly affected by the passage of time. The total lack of a statute of limitations gives them blanket authority to go after such a person if they chose to do so, and it could be abused in the future.
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Yes, I agree and that was my point.
In GORBACH, ET AL. V. RENO, The 9th district court ruled against the then INS and made it more difficult to denaturalize based on administrative decision. I would hope that he court system would prevent such abuses in the future as well.
Jackolantern
Registered Users (C)
Unfortunately, once you end up in court over such a situation, even if you prevail you get significantly hurt financially and otherwise. Somebody who could not afford a decent lawyer could still find themselves wrongly losing their citizenship.
TheRealCanadian
Volunteer Moderator
Be careful what you ask for. The consequences of such a change might be to make the current security checks even longer and more cumbersome.
The passage of time makes the burden of the state much harder as well. I do not spend my time worrying about ancient allegations, nor was this case (as I understand it) based on them. It was based on public records, which to me is a different matter altogether.
Bobsmyth, thanks for pointing to the poverty of my analogy 
Hey, it was just an analogy, it didn't intend to be perfect. Here goes, not an analogy, but something that could really bite someone and for which, for good or for bad, innocent or guilty a statute of limitation would give protections. Imagine the case of an ex-lover (ex-spouse if you want) that upon realizing that he/she can get someone denaturalized and deported from this country makes some allegations that one has raped or somewhat committed any other sexual offense against her during a period before obtaining naturalization. How do you defend against something like this? It could be someone alleging that you did some drug dealing, perhaps someone is falsely accusing you, someone out there wanting to take revenge against you. With a statute of limitations one wouldn't have to worry about any nutter making some false accusations just to get you denaturalized and deported Anyway, I know I am not going to convince you because we see the issue differently, I think you're caught in thinking of people who are guilty and I might be caught in that justice is not perfect, and the individual should have protections, even if it means a few bad apples get away with obtaining a benefit they didn't deserve in the first place. For me, a statute of limitations makes a lot of sense, otherwise we are second class citizens, even beyond not being able to become president of the United States.
Hey, it was just an analogy, it didn't intend to be perfect. Here goes, not an analogy, but something that could really bite someone and for which, for good or for bad, innocent or guilty a statute of limitation would give protections. Imagine the case of an ex-lover (ex-spouse if you want) that upon realizing that he/she can get someone denaturalized and deported from this country makes some allegations that one has raped or somewhat committed any other sexual offense against her during a period before obtaining naturalization. How do you defend against something like this? It could be someone alleging that you did some drug dealing, perhaps someone is falsely accusing you, someone out there wanting to take revenge against you. With a statute of limitations one wouldn't have to worry about any nutter making some false accusations just to get you denaturalized and deported Anyway, I know I am not going to convince you because we see the issue differently, I think you're caught in thinking of people who are guilty and I might be caught in that justice is not perfect, and the individual should have protections, even if it means a few bad apples get away with obtaining a benefit they didn't deserve in the first place. For me, a statute of limitations makes a lot of sense, otherwise we are second class citizens, even beyond not being able to become president of the United States.thedeepsea
Registered Users (C)
The way i look at is we now have permanent residency that does not expire.
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I think the root of the problem here is the definition of "good moral character". To determine it, the government can look any number of years back into someone's life. I think it should be limited to 5-10 years. This way one does not have to withold information on N-400 or fear for his/her citizenship the whole life. Anybody can make a mistake, but a person should have a chance to correct it. Needless to say, the guy in the article deserves losing his citizenship.
thedeepsea
Registered Users (C)
I think if he kept his nose clean, his past would not have been investigated. Remenber his convicted of passport fraud in 2006. I am sure that is what started the look into his background.
It would take much more than mere heresy from an ex-spouse to have someone denaturalized. My argument still remains that a statute of limitations should not be valid for major cases such as withholding past criminal activities since citizenship is a privilege and not a right. This is especially true for war criminals who have become US citizens many years ago but did not divulge their past and are later denaturalized and deported.
Jackolantern
Registered Users (C)
Acquiring citizenship is a privilege, but after that owning it is most definitely a right. A right that is weakened if you obtained it through naturalization rather than birth, but it is still a right.
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I didn't mean hearsay, I meant someone taking you to court and getting you convicted using false accusations. Why is it so hard to believe that the justice system might make mistakes? It does, and citizens should have protections against them. See all the rash of lawsuits against Catholic priests. I am sure most were done properly, but perhaps more than one were based on exaggerations or false information. As said, it is hard to defend oneself after many years when there is no sufficient documentation or witnesses. Perhaps we can agree that a statute of limitation should exist except for major cases like having participated in genocide or other major crimes against humanity. My point is that denaturalization should not be a weapon to be used routinely to rid the country of "undesirables". I think if the naturalization process were changed for something purely time based (number of years living in the U.S.) instead of a privilege and moral character thing we could avoid a lot of grief and taxpayer expense.
speaking of mad ex-girlfriends - Dear Gentlemen, please be wiser - if you already made one mistake and dated aggressive clingy woman - don't repeat mistake! Leave her only after creating full illusion that she left you herself - it's a safest way out, else - see movie "Fatal Attraction"
TheRealCanadian
Volunteer Moderator
It's pretty established common law (for centuries now) that anything entered into via fraud or other false pretenses can be unwound on that basis alone.
It's not about not being able to unwind things because of fraud, it is about statue of limitation of when this can be prosecuted, and it is also about what constitutes fraud deserving of denaturalization. Let's imagine that one stole a pear from their childhood neighbor orchard. Unbeknown to this person the neighbor took a picture and some fingerprints from other pears touched by the thief. Nothing is done at the time. The person naturalizes and after that the crime surfaces, there is evidence, and this person said nothing about the pear thievery in the application, so he lied under oath saying he didn't commit any crime. Would it be ok, in your opinion that this person is stripped from his citizenship and deported for this? Would you leave some room to measure the size of the crime, the time when it happened, the ties of the person to the community, or would you just throw this person to the lions, or would you be the first in line to cast the biblical stone?
It shows I don't have much else to do than to send replies to this thread but hey, I have to kill a lot of time waiting for my child's N-600 application to go through. It has always been my pet peeve to see laws being very biased against immigrants. I don't mean that all laws are biased, just the ones that are, like for example the 1996 immigrant responsibility act. All this thing about green card revocation, citizenship denaturalization. There are always good reasons to do things like that, but there are overall good people who sometimes get caught into this mess that could deserve better treatment, some sort of leniency. How many people might be in this country thanks to their parents or grandparents doing a small fib in some application. People who might now be asking for immigrant's blood in the arena if they do something that has an inkling of illegality. I am not condoning fraud, or lying in applications, I am just saying that for the good of everyone and to save money to taxpayers it would be good to have a statue of limitation, you give a number of years for something to come up, or to detect some fraud, after that you stop wasting money looking into it. If the person turns up to have a crime in the past that was not prosecuted, do it now if the crime can still be prosecuted, but without touching the citizenship status.
My apologies if I am writing too much, but again, I think the immigrant and naturalized citizens are the underdog and need people to speak to defend their rights
My 2 cents.
but hey, I have to kill a lot of time waiting for my child's N-600 application to go through. It has always been my pet peeve to see laws being very biased against immigrants. I don't mean that all laws are biased, just the ones that are, like for example the 1996 immigrant responsibility act. All this thing about green card revocation, citizenship denaturalization. There are always good reasons to do things like that, but there are overall good people who sometimes get caught into this mess that could deserve better treatment, some sort of leniency. How many people might be in this country thanks to their parents or grandparents doing a small fib in some application. People who might now be asking for immigrant's blood in the arena if they do something that has an inkling of illegality. I am not condoning fraud, or lying in applications, I am just saying that for the good of everyone and to save money to taxpayers it would be good to have a statue of limitation, you give a number of years for something to come up, or to detect some fraud, after that you stop wasting money looking into it. If the person turns up to have a crime in the past that was not prosecuted, do it now if the crime can still be prosecuted, but without touching the citizenship status.My apologies if I am writing too much, but again, I think the immigrant and naturalized citizens are the underdog and need people to speak to defend their rights
My 2 cents.
TheRealCanadian
Volunteer Moderator
Considering that the crime in question has nothing to do with a pear tree, the size of the crime is a false statement under oath and I therefore have no problem with having the book thrown at them.
People don't get denaturalized and deported for little fibs; they get citizenship stripped based on the concealment of material facts in terms of criminal history or involvement in crimes against humanity. Such crimes are heinous enough that I don't want people who are both criminals and liars in my country.
As to the best of my recollection I have neither committed a felony nor lied about it under oath, I feel that I am in place to cast the biblical first stone; if the future holds otherwise I will take another biblical injunction to heart and die by the same sword I have lived by.
The John Demjanjuk case is a good example of how the US government (OSI unit) has been trying for over 25 years to denaturalize and deport him for lying on his naturalization application. At one point the OSI prosecutor was found guilty of withholding evidence in his case and the charges against him were dropped. In the end, his case made it all the way to the Supreme Court who refused to hear his latest appeal a few weeks ago. The irony is that he has been stripped of his citizenship but can't be deported since he is now stateless and no country will accept him.
For good or for bad this is the state of things:
http://www.philadelphiaimmigrationlawyerblog.com/2008/03/naturalized_as_a_us_citizen_an.html
Perhaps he stole a few pears from the neighbor's field Definitely this is not a crime against humanity case as far as I can say.
http://www.philadelphiaimmigrationlawyerblog.com/2008/03/naturalized_as_a_us_citizen_an.html
Perhaps he stole a few pears from the neighbor's field
Definitely this is not a crime against humanity case as far as I can say.