Claude Stephen Bent, a Jamaican national and lawful permanent resident, pleaded no contest to felony charges in California in 2006. The state court did not advise him of the immigration consequences of his plea. Following his release from prison in 2016, the Department of Homeland Security detained him and initiated removal proceedings based on his conviction as an aggravated felony. After multiple appeals and a final order of removal in 2021, Bent moved to vacate his conviction in state court under California Penal Code § 1473.7(a)(1). The state court granted the motion, finding that Bent was unable to meaningfully understand the immigration consequences of his plea, rendering it involuntary and constitutionally invalid. Bent then moved to reopen his removal proceedings before the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA). The BIA denied the motion, ruling it was untimely and that the vacatur was merely 'rehabilitative' and did not affect the conviction's validity for immigration purposes.
The Ninth Circuit panel, writing for the majority, agreed with both the petitioner and the government that the BIA erred. First, the court addressed the nature of the vacatur. The BIA had incorrectly concluded that California Penal Code § 1473.7(a)(1) allows vacaturs solely to alleviate immigration consequences. The court clarified that the plain text of the statute allows a person to vacate a conviction if it is 'legally invalid due to prejudicial error damaging the moving party’s ability to meaningfully understand, defend against, or knowingly accept the actual or potential adverse immigration consequences.' The state court's order explicitly set aside the plea because it was an involuntary plea in violation of the Fifth Amendment, not to mitigate immigration consequences. Therefore, the conviction was vacated on substantive grounds, not rehabilitative ones. Second, the court addressed equitable tolling. The BIA had measured the petitioner's diligence from the date of his 2006 conviction. The Ninth Circuit held that diligence must be measured from the date a reasonable person would be put on notice of the error. Bent had no reason to suspect the plea was constitutionally deficient until he was served a Notice to Appear in 2016. The court noted that while Bent waited five years after the statute became available in 2017 to seek vacatur, the record was not clear enough to dismiss the diligence claim as frivolous, especially given his active defense of the removal proceedings. The court also left open the question of whether the vacatur itself constitutes an 'extraordinary circumstance' for equitable tolling, a matter for the BIA to resolve on remand.
The case is remanded to the Board of Immigration Appeals. The BIA must now adjudicate Bent's motion to reopen removal proceedings under the correct legal standard that recognizes the vacatur as substantive rather than rehabilitative. The BIA must also reassess whether Bent exercised due diligence in pursuing his rights starting from 2016, when he received notice of the immigration consequences, and determine if the vacatur constitutes an extraordinary circumstance warranting equitable tolling. The petitioner's separate petition for review regarding his asylum claim remains in abeyance pending the outcome of this remand.
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