quick reference chart and notes for determining immigration - ILRC

California Quick Reference Chart and Notes
February 2010
§ N.3 Record of Conviction and Divisible Statutes
A. Overview: The Categorical and Modified Categorical Analysis
B. When Does the Categorical Approach Not Apply to a Conviction? Moral Turpitude
and “Circumstance Specific” Offenses
C. What Documents Can the Immigration Judge Consult (“Reviewable Record of
Conviction”)?
D. Charging Papers, Plea Agreements, Minute Orders and Abstracts of Judgment
E. Identify a Safer “Factual Basis for the Plea”
§ N.4 Sentence Solutions
A. Definition of Sentence, Defense Strategies
B. Offenses that Become an Aggravated Felony Based upon a Sentence of One Year or
More
C. “Sentence Imposed” and the Petty Offense Exception to the Moral Turpitude
Inadmissibility Ground
§ N. 5 Immigration Holds and Detention; When To, and When Not To, Obtain Release from
Criminal Incarceration
§ N.6 Aggravated Felonies
A. Definition of Aggravated Felony
B. Penalties for Conviction: Barred from Immigration Applications.
C. Penalties for Conviction: Federal Offense of Illegal Re-entry
D. List of Aggravated Felonies
§ N.7 Crimes Involving Moral Turpitude
A. Overview
B. Deportation Ground
C. Ground of Inadmissibility
§ N.8 Drug Offenses
A. Overview of Penalties for Drug Offenses
B. Key Defense Strategies: Create a Record that Does Not Specify the Controlled
Substance; Plead to Accessory After the Fact
C. Simple Possession or Less
D. Sale and Other Offenses beyond Possession
E. Conduct-Based Grounds: Government has “Reason to Believe” Involvement in
Trafficking; Formal Admission of a Drug Trafficking Offense; Drug Abuser/Addict
F. Chart for Pleading to a Drug Offense: Ninth Circuit Law and Lopez-Gonzalez
§ N.9 Domestic Violence, Child Abuse, Stalking
A. Conviction of a Crime of Domestic Violence
B. Finding of Violation of a Domestic Violence Protective Order
C. Conviction of a Crime of Child Abuse, Neglect or Abandonment
D. Conviction for stalking
Immigrant Legal Resource Center N-3