Omar v. Lynch

United States Court of Appeals
For the First Circuit
No. 15-1258
SOHIEL OMAR,
Petitioner,
v.
LORETTA E. LYNCH,*
Attorney General of the United States,
Respondent.
PETITION FOR REVIEW OF AN ORDER
OF THE BOARD OF IMMIGRATION APPEALS
Before
Lynch, Stahl, and Barron,
Circuit Judges.
Linda Kenepaske and Law Offices of Linda Kenepaske, PLLC on
brief for petitioner.
Benjamin C. Mizer, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney
General, Civil Division, Cindy S. Ferrier, Assistant Director, and
Lindsay M. Murphy, Trial Attorney, Office of Immigration
Litigation, U.S. Department of Justice, on brief for respondent.
February 25, 2016
* Pursuant to Fed. R. App. P. 43(c)(2), Attorney General
Loretta E. Lynch has been substituted for former Attorney General
Eric H. Holder, Jr., as the respondent.
BARRON, Circuit Judge. Sohiel Omar is a native and
citizen of Pakistan. He was ordered removed more than a decade
ago, and he appealed that order to the Board of Immigration Appeals
("BIA") in a timely manner. After that appeal failed, he then
filed a timely motion to reconsider, but the BIA rejected that
motion as well. More than a decade later, Omar filed a second
motion to reconsider. That motion, too, was denied. He now
petitions for review of the BIA's denial of his second motion to
reconsider. We deny the petition for review.
I.
We begin by recounting the somewhat lengthy procedural
history that led to the BIA's ruling that is at issue here. On
January 26, 1998, the former Immigration and Naturalization
Service charged Omar with removability based on a set of 1994
convictions that rendered him an aggravated felon.
At his removal hearing, Omar sought relief under § 212(c)
of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952, Pub. L. No. 82-
414, 66 Stat. 163, 187, as amended by Immigration Act of 1990,
§ 511(a), Pub. L. No. 101-649, 104 Stat. 4978, 5052, as amended by
Miscellaneous and Technical Immigration and Naturalization
Amendments of 1991, § 306(a)(10), Pub. L. No. 102-232, 105 Stat.
1733, 1751. Under that provision, the Attorney General had
relatively broad discretion to grant relief to aliens otherwise
deemed inadmissible or removable if they had established a lawful,
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unrelinquished domicile in the United States of seven consecutive
years. Id.
The Immigration Judge ("IJ") rejected Omar's request for
§ 212(c) relief on August 26, 2002. The IJ ruled that the passage
of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act
("IIRIRA"), § 304(b), Pub. L. No. 104-208, 110 Stat. 3009-546,
3009-597, in September 1996 barred Omar from obtaining such relief,
notwithstanding that Omar's 1994 convictions pre-dated the
IIRIRA's enactment.
The IJ reasoned that the IIRIRA applied retroactively to
Omar based on the IJ's interpretation of the Supreme Court's
decision in I.N.S. v. St. Cyr, 533 U.S. 289 (2001). There, the
Supreme Court held that the provision of the IIRIRA that eliminated
§ 212(c) relief did not apply retroactively to aliens who, in
reliance on the availability of § 212(c) relief, pleaded guilty
(or nolo contendere) to offenses with admissibility or
removability consequences prior to September 30, 1996. But the IJ
concluded that because Omar's convictions resulted from a
trial -- rather than a plea -- the IIRIRA did, consistent with St.
Cyr, apply retroactively to bar Omar from seeking § 212(c) relief.
Omar timely appealed that ruling to the BIA. He argued,
among other things, that the IJ had misconstrued St. Cyr by not
extending it to apply to convictions rendered after trial. The
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BIA rejected that argument and affirmed the IJ's decision without
opinion in a per curiam order dated January 30, 2003.
Following the BIA's ruling, Omar was removed from the
United States to Ireland on or about February 14, 2003. On
February 27, 2003, Omar filed a timely motion for reconsideration
of the BIA's denial of his appeal.
In his motion to reconsider, Omar reasserted his right
to § 212(c) relief on the basis of St. Cyr. On March 31, 2003,
the BIA denied the motion. The BIA did so summarily, stating that
"it had considered [Omar's] arguments" and "f[ound] no reason to
disturb [its prior] decision." Omar does not appear to have
petitioned this Court for review of either the BIA's denial of his
appeal or of the BIA's denial of his first motion to reconsider.
More than a decade later, however, on August 7, 2014,
Omar filed a second motion to reconsider the BIA's January 2003
removal order. Omar based this second motion to reconsider on the
BIA's decision in Matter of Abdelghany, 26 I. & N. Dec. 254 (BIA
2014).
There, the BIA held -- relying in part on intervening
precedent applying St. Cyr -- that § 212(c) relief was available
to aliens convicted after trial. See id. at 268 ("[W]e are
convinced that Supreme Court and emerging circuit court precedent
has superseded the regulatory prohibition against granting section
212(c) relief under St. Cyr to aliens convicted after trial.").
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Abdelghany instructed immigration judges going forward to "treat
deportable lawful permanent residents convicted after trial no
differently for purposes of section 212(c) eligibility than
deportable lawful permanent residents convicted by means of plea
agreements." Id.
Notwithstanding Abdelghany, the BIA rejected Omar's
second motion to reconsider. The BIA did so on the grounds that
his motion was time- and number-barred under 8 U.S.C.
§ 1229a(c)(5)(B), Pub. L. No. 104-208, 110 Stat. 3009-546, 3009-
593 (1996), and that Omar had failed to show that equitable tolling
of the time and number bars was warranted. See Neves v. Holder,
613 F.3d 30, 36 (1st Cir. 2010) (per curiam) ("The equitable
tolling doctrine extends statutory deadlines in extraordinary
circumstances for parties who were prevented from complying with
them through no fault or lack of diligence of their own.").
Specifically, the BIA held that a change in the law favorable to
petitioner that "occurr[ed] long after the expiration of
[petitioner's] filing deadline d[id] not constitute extraordinary
circumstances justifying equitable tolling."
Omar now seeks review of the BIA's decision.
II.
We review the BIA's denial of a motion to reconsider for
abuse of discretion, assuming without deciding that equitable
tolling is available in this context. See Barrios v. Gonzales,
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136 F. App'x 934, 937 (7th Cir. 2005) (unpublished) (declining to
decide whether motions to reconsider, as distinct from motions to
reopen, are subject to equitable tolling); cf. Mata v. Lynch, 135
S. Ct. 2150, 2155 n.3 (2015); Neves, 613 F.3d at 36 (assuming
without deciding that the time and number limits applicable to
motions to reopen are subject to equitable tolling). A denial of
a motion to reconsider is an abuse of discretion "only when the
'denial was made without a rational explanation, inexplicably
departed from established policies, or rested on an impermissible
basis.'" Bolieiro v. Holder, 731 F.3d 32, 36 (1st Cir. 2013)
(quoting Martinez-Lopez v. Holder, 704 F.3d 169, 172 (1st Cir.
2013)). To prevail on a theory of equitable tolling, an individual
must show "(1) that he has been pursuing his rights diligently,
and (2) that some extraordinary circumstance stood in his way" and
prevented timely filing. Neves, 613 F.3d at 36.1
1 We follow the BIA and the parties in applying the equitable
tolling framework to assess not only whether Omar's second motion
to reconsider is time-barred but also whether it is number-barred.
We question, however, whether equitable tolling is the appropriate
framework for analyzing whether a second motion to reconsider may
be considered, as there is no clock to toll with a number bar.
See 8 U.S.C. § 1229a(c)(6)(A). Accordingly, different
considerations might bear on the question whether an equitable
exception should be recognized to a limitation on the number of
filings an alien may make than would bear on the question whether
a deadline for making a filing should be equitably tolled. Cf.
compare 28 U.S.C. § 2255(h) (setting forth standards for allowing
a "second or successive" federal petition for writ of habeas
corpus), with Holland v. Florida, 560 U.S. 631, 645, 649 (2010)
(setting forth equitable tolling standard for late-filed habeas
petitions).
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Omar contends that the BIA erred in concluding that the
circumstances of his case were not sufficiently extraordinary to
warrant an equitable exception to the time and number bars
applicable to Omar's motion. And Omar appears to do so by arguing
that the following circumstances, in combination, make his case an
"extraordinary" one: (1) he was effectively denied the opportunity
to file his first motion to reconsider because his removal from
the United States triggered what is known as the "departure bar,"
which putatively stripped the BIA of jurisdiction to consider that
motion at the time that he filed it;2 (2) the BIA denied his legal
argument for § 212(c) relief only via summary rulings; and (3) his
legal argument was ultimately embraced by the BIA in its subsequent
decision in Abdelghany.
We do not agree. In concluding that Omar did not
overcome the time and number bars that Omar concedes would
otherwise apply, the BIA did not abuse its discretion.
First, while Omar suggests that it is inappropriate to
count his first motion to reconsider for number-bar purposes given
the applicability of the departure bar, the record indicates that
the BIA denied Omar's initial motion to reconsider on the merits
2 See 8 C.F.R. § 1003.2(d); Matter of Armendarez-Mendez, 24
I. & N. Dec. 646, 660 (BIA 2008) (affirming the continued validity
of the departure bar). But see Santana v. Holder, 731 F.3d 50, 61
(1st Cir. 2013) (overruling Armendarez-Mendez to the extent that
it interferes with an alien's statutory right to seek reopening of
a final order of removal).
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rather than on departure bar grounds. But, in any event, Omar did
not argue to the BIA in his second motion to reconsider that it
was really his first such motion due to the departure bar. Nor
did he argue that the potential application of the departure bar
to his first motion constitutes an extraordinary circumstance that
should enable him to bring this motion years after the initial one
was denied. As a result, Omar's "departure bar"-based argument
for finding, on equitable tolling grounds, his second motion to
reconsider not to be time- or number-barred is not properly before
us. See Silva v. Gonzales, 463 F.3d 68, 72 (1st Cir. 2006) ("Under
the exhaustion of remedies doctrine, theories insufficiently
developed before the BIA may not be raised before this court.").3
Second, the fact that the BIA denied Omar's legal
arguments through summary means is not itself "extraordinary."
The BIA did address Omar's original appeal claim through its
"affirmance without opinion" procedure, but that procedure is a
permissible one. See 8 C.F.R. 1003.1(e)(4); Albathani v. I.N.S.,
318 F.3d 365, 377-80 (1st Cir. 2003) (holding that the BIA's
affirmance without opinion procedure does not violate principles
of due process or administrative law).
3Omar also argues that he was deprived of due process because
he was denied an opportunity for reconsideration on account of the
departure bar. But that issue, too, is not properly before us, as
Omar failed to raise it before the BIA. See Silva, 463 F.3d at
72.
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Finally, we are not persuaded by Omar's contention that
because the BIA did eventually adopt the position underlying his
legal claim regarding the availability of § 212(c) relief that he
had unsuccessfully presented to the IJ in 2002 and to the BIA in
2003, he should be able to present that claim again now. The BIA
concluded that its forward-looking re-interpretation of the IIRIRA
in Abdelghany -- based on what the BIA termed "emerging"
precedent -- did not constitute the kind of extraordinary
circumstance that would warrant allowing Omar to file a motion to
reconsider eleven years after the time for filing had passed. In
light of the BIA's interest in finality, we find no abuse of
discretion in that ruling here. Cf. Muyubisnay-Cungachi v. Holder,
734 F.3d 66, 71 (1st Cir. 2013) (noting that motions to reopen
immigration proceedings "are disfavored as contrary to 'the
compelling public interests in finality and the expeditious
processing of proceedings'" (citation omitted)); Whiteside v.
United States, 775 F.3d 180, 186-87 (4th Cir. 2014) (noting in the
habeas context that the interest in finality militates against
construing changes in law as extraordinary for equitable tolling
purposes).4
4We note that in denying Omar's second motion to reconsider,
the BIA expressly declined to reconsider Omar's case sua sponte.
That discretionary decision, however, is one that we have no
jurisdiction to review. See Charuc v. Holder, 737 F.3d 113, 115
(1st Cir. 2013).
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III.
The petition for review of the BIA's denial of Omar's
second motion to reconsider is DENIED.
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