News
2007-03-23
U.S. appeals
court blocks order for Ugandan lesbian's deportation
A federal appeals
court in Minneapolis has blocked the deportation
of a Ugandan woman who was seeking asylum becau
A federal appeals
court in Minneapolis has blocked the deportation
of a Ugandan woman who was seeking asylum because she was
persecuted in her homeland for being a lesbian,
sending her case back to the Board of Immigration
Appeals for further proceedings.
A three-judge
panel of the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals said the BIA
misapplied the law and overstepped its authority in the case
of Olivia Nabulwala, who sought asylum after the U.S.
government tried to deport her for overstaying her
visitor's visa.
According to
Nabulwala, while she was in Uganda her father became very
angry and an aunt physically abused her when she came out to
her family while she was in high school. She said she
needed hospitalization overnight after a mob attacked
a meeting of a lesbian rights group she belonged to
while she was attending university in Uganda, and on another
occasion two relatives arranged for her to be raped by a
stranger. She came to the U.S. in 2001.
Courts have
established that gay people can qualify for asylum
because of persecution or a well-founded fear of
persecution, the 8th Circuit panel noted.
But the
immigration judge in Bloomington, Minn., who handled
Nabulwala's case, Joseph Dierkes, denied her application,
even though he found her story "generally credible"
and said he did not doubt she suffered in Uganda
because of her orientation.
The 8th Circuit
panel said both the immigration judge and the BIA, which
upheld the judge's decision, had misapplied the applicable
laws and procedures. It also said the BIA had made
findings of fact that it lacked the legal authority to
make. The panel ordered the BIA to revisit the case.
(AP)
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