29672: Hermantin(News)U.S. still trying to deport ex-citizen (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: leonie hermantin <lhermantin@hotmail.com>


Posted on Sat, Dec. 16, 2006

IMMIGRATION

U.S. still trying to deport ex-citizen
After France and his native Haiti refused to accept convict Lionel 
Jean-Baptiste, U.S. authorities now want to deport him to the Dominican 
Republic.

BY ALFONSO CHARDY
achardy@MiamiHerald.com

U.S. officials have notified Lionel Jean-Baptiste, the first naturalized 
American in 44 years ordered deported after losing citizenship over a drug 
conviction, that they will try to remove him to the Dominican Republic after 
Haiti and France refused to take him.

Jean-Baptiste told The Miami Herald that he received the notification Tuesday, 
the deadline for an administrative review of his custody case.

Under federal regulations, immigration officers review a foreign detainee's 
custody 90 days after his deportation order becomes final -- if removal has not 
been carried out. The U.S. Supreme Court has said foreign nationals who cannot 
be deported can be held in detention up to six months -- unless officials 
classify them as a danger to the community or ''special circumstance'' cases.

Jean-Baptiste, in a telephone call to The Miami Herald from the Krome detention 
center, said his deportation officer told him that if he cannot be deported, he 
may have to be released under conditions of supervision. It was the most 
definite statement to date from the government indicating that Jean-Baptiste 
could be released.

Barbara Gonzalez, a Miami spokeswoman for U.S. Immigration and Customs 
Enforcement, said: ``The case is still under review. Our obligation as a law 
enforcement agency is to carry out orders of removal as issued by immigration 
judges.''

Immigration judge Kenneth S. Hurewitz on Sept. 12 ordered Jean Baptiste, 59, 
deported to his native Haiti -- but advised him that he may get to stay in the 
United States if the Haitian government refused to take him back.

Haiti declined to take back Jean-Baptiste because he renounced his Haitian 
citizenship when he swore allegiance to the United States in 1996.

The French consulate in Miami also declined to take Jean-Baptiste because 
officials could not find any proof he was a citizen of France.

Officials at the Miami consulate of the Dominican Republic said they were not 
aware of the case but that they would look into it.

It's the first time since 1962 that a denaturalized citizen has been ordered 
deported after a drug conviction. In that case, an Italian-American was 
stripped of citizenship and then ordered deported -- the case cited as 
precedent in Jean-Baptiste's immigration court proceedings.

Jean-Baptiste arrived as a refugee in 1980. In April 1996, Jean-Baptiste became 
a U.S. citizen. But six months later he was indicted on drug-trafficking 
charges and federal agents arrested him.

Jean-Baptiste pleaded not guilty, but a federal jury convicted him in January 
1997.

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