Background
Israel Armando Cabrera Ramirez entered a conditional guilty plea to unlawful reentry in violation of section one thousand three hundred twenty-six of title eight of the United States Code. He appealed the district court’s denial of his motion to dismiss the criminal information under section one thousand three hundred twenty-six subsection d of title eighteen of the United States Code.
The court’s reasoning
The court reviewed the district court’s order de novo and its factual findings for clear error. To succeed on a collateral attack under section one thousand three hundred twenty-six subsection d, a defendant must exhaust administrative remedies, show the proceedings deprived him of judicial review, and prove the entry of the order was fundamentally unfair. The court defined fundamental unfairness as requiring a due process violation in the deportation proceeding and resulting prejudice. Prejudice requires showing plausible grounds for relief. Although the defendant applied for cancellation of removal, he failed to establish that relief was warranted as a matter of discretion given his extensive criminal history and lack of rehabilitation.
What it means going forward
The decision reinforces that defendants challenging unlawful reentry convictions must demonstrate not only procedural defects in their removal proceedings but also that they would likely have obtained discretionary relief had those defects not occurred.
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