Case: 18-60264 Document: 00515473690 Page: 1 Date Filed: 07/01/2020 IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit FILED July 1, 2020 No. 18-60264 Lyle W. Cayce Clerk GEORGE EDUARD NASTASE, Petitioner, v. WILLIAM P. BARR, U. S. ATTORNEY GENERAL, Respondent. Petitions for Review of the Orders of the Board of Immigration Appeals Before ELROD, WILLETT, and OLDHAM, Circuit Judges. JENNIFER WALKER ELROD, Circuit Judge: Romanian native George Eduard Nastase petitions for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) decisions denying his applications for adjustment of immigration status and for a waiver of inadmissibility. The first petition is DENIED and the second petition is DENIED in part and DISMISSED in part for lack of jurisdiction. I. Nastase was born in 1985 in Romania. In 1986, he was admitted to the United States as a refugee in the care of his parents. After his parents divorced eight years later, Nastase lived with his mother and siblings. In 1999, his mother became a naturalized citizen. Case: 18-60264 Document: 00515473690 Page: 2 Date Filed: 07/01/2020 No. 18-60264 In 2006, Nastase applied for adjustment of his immigration status under 8 U.S.C. § 1159(a), which (if granted) would cause him to “be regarded as lawfully admitted to the United States for permanent residence as of the date of [his] arrival into the United States.” That application was denied in 2012 on the basis that Nastase’s criminal record rendered him inadmissible. Specifically, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) reasoned that his 2007 conviction for delivery of a simulated controlled substance made him ineligible for adjustment of status under 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(2)(C)(i), which states that “[a]ny alien who . . . the Attorney General knows or has reason to believe . . . is or has been an illicit trafficker in any controlled substance . . . is inadmissible.” Nastase committed miscellaneous other crimes in 2012 and the years following: theft, credit card abuse, and criminal trespass—all misdemeanors—and felony possession of less than one gram of a controlled substance (methamphetamine). Those crimes landed Nastase in the Dallas County Jail in 2012, where he was identified by Department of Homeland Security (“DHS”) agents. DHS then instigated removal proceedings against him. Because Nastase was not in federal custody at the time, the Immigration Judge (IJ) administratively closed the proceedings. When the removal proceedings restarted in 2017, DHS alleged two bases of removability: (1) that Nastase had been “convicted of two or more crimes involving moral turpitude” under 8 U.S.C. § 1227(a)(2)(A)(ii), and (2) that he had been convicted of a crime “relating to a controlled substance” under § 1227(a)(2)(B)(i). Nastase defended the charges by arguing that he had gained derivative United States citizenship when his mother became a citizen. See 8 U.S.C. § 1431(a). As all this was taking place, Nastase again applied for an adjustment of status under § 1159(a). This time, mindful of the denial of his 2 Case: 18-60264 Document: 00515473690 Page: 3 ...
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