United States Court of Appeals For the First Circuit No. 21-1111 AMAURY VLADIMIR REYES-BATISTA, Petitioner, v. MERRICK B. GARLAND, Attorney General, Respondent. PETITON FOR REVIEW OF AN ORDER OF THE BOARD OF IMMIGRATION APPEALS Before Barron, Chief Judge, Howard and Gelpí, Circuit Judges. Stuart Altman, Law Office of Stuart Altman, for petitioner. Todd J. Cochran, Office of Immigration Litigation, Civil Division, United States Department of Justice, with whom Brian M. Boynton, Assistant Attorney General, and John S. Hogan, Assistant Director, Office of Immigration Litigation, were on brief, for respondent. October 7, 2022 HOWARD, Circuit Judge. Petitioner Amaury Vladimir Reyes-Batista seeks review of the Board of Immigration Appeals' ("BIA") dismissal of his appeal of an immigration judge's ("IJ") order denying him relief from removal. Reyes-Batista argues that the BIA erred in denying him nunc pro tunc relief under former § 212(c) of the Immigration and Nationality Act ("INA") and on equitable estoppel grounds. Discerning no error in the agency decision, we deny the petition. I. Reyes-Batista, a citizen of the Dominican Republic, was granted lawful permanent resident ("LPR") status in October 1990, at the age of fourteen. In 1996, he was convicted in New York of third-degree attempted criminal sale of a controlled substance (heroin). As a result, the government initiated removal proceedings against him in Oakdale, Louisiana. At his removal hearing, Reyes-Batista sought relief under former § 212(c) of the INA. See 8 U.S.C. § 1182(c) (1996). Section 212(c) gave the Attorney General discretion to waive removal for certain LPRs, provided that they had established a domicile in the United States for seven consecutive years. An IJ found that Reyes-Batista did not meet the seven-year domicile requirement necessary for relief and ordered him removed. Reyes-Batista was removed to the Dominican Republic in October 1996. - 2 - Reyes-Batista later made his way back to the United States, entering without inspection. In 2015, he was charged in the U.S. District Court for the District of Connecticut with various offenses stemming from his involvement in a fraudulent tax scheme. See United States v. Reyes-Batista, 844 F. App'x 404, 406 (2d. Cir. 2021). An additional charge for illegal reentry under 8 U.S.C. § 1326(a) was dismissed before trial because the district court found that Reyes-Batista was prejudiced by a fundamental procedural error in his 1996 removal proceeding when the IJ informed him that he was ineligible for § 212(c) relief. According to the district court, Reyes-Batista's mother's lawful residency "could be imputed" to him for purposes of establishing the seven- year domicile period. Reyes-Batista was convicted of the fraud-related charges and sentenced to time served, plus three years of supervised release and restitution. Reyes-Batista, 844 F. App'x at 406. In early 2021, the Second Circuit affirmed his convictions. Id. at 410. On December 9, 2019, the Department of Homeland Security ("DHS") initiated removal proceedings against Reyes-Batista by filing a Notice to Appear ("NTA") in Boston immigration court. The NTA charged Reyes-Batista with removability based on four INA provisions: 1) § 212(a)(2)(C) (8 U.S.C. …
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