United States Court of Appeals For the First Circuit No. 22-1081 SERGIO RODOLFO LAPARRA-DELEON, Petitioner, v. MERRICK B. GARLAND, UNITED STATES ATTORNEY GENERAL, Respondent. PETITION FOR REVIEW OF AN ORDER OF THE BOARD OF IMMIGRATION APPEALS Before Barron, Chief Judge, Selya and Howard, Circuit Judges. Lidia M. Sanchez, for petitioner. Kristin Macleod-Ball and Trina Realmuto on brief for National Immigration Litigation Alliance, Political Asylum/Immigration Representation Project, American Immigration Lawyers Association, and American Immigration Council, amici curiae. Elizabeth K. Fitzgerald-Sambou, Senior Litigation Counsel, Office of Immigration Litigation, U.S. Department of Justice, with whom Brian M. Boynton, Principal Deputy, Assistant Attorney General, Civil Division, and John W. Blakeley, Assistant Director, Office of Immigration Litigation, were on brief, for respondent. November 4, 2022 BARRON, Chief Judge. Sergio Rodolfo Laparra-Deleon, a native and citizen of Guatemala, petitions for review of a decision by the Board of Immigration Appeals ("BIA") that denied his motion to reopen and terminate his removal proceedings, or, in the alternative, to reopen and rescind the in absentia removal order against him. We deny the petition as to the motion to reopen to terminate the removal proceedings but grant the petition and vacate the BIA's ruling as to the motion to reopen and rescind the removal order. I. Laparra-Deleon entered the United States without inspection in or around January 2002. More than six years later, in July 2008, he was served with a document from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security ("DHS"). The document charged him with removability under § 212(a)(6)(A)(i) of the Immigration and Nationality Act ("INA") and ordered him "to appear before an immigration judge" for his removal proceedings in Boston, Massachusetts "on a date to be set at a time to be set." Nearly two years later, the Immigration Court in Boston sent Laparra-Deleon another document. This document informed him that the removal proceedings "ha[d] been scheduled for a MASTER hearing before the Immigration Court on Apr[il] 8, 2010 at 1:30 P.M." in Boston. The document was returned as undeliverable to the Immigration Court. - 2 - Laparra-Deleon did not appear at the "hearing" referred to in the document from the Immigration Court. For that reason, he was ordered removed in absentia pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1229a(b)(5)(A). That measure provides, in relevant part: [a]ny alien who, after written notice required under paragraph (1) or (2) of section 1229(a) of this title has been provided to the alien or the alien's counsel of record, does not attend a proceeding under this section, shall be ordered removed in absentia if the [INS] establishes by clear, unequivocal, and convincing evidence that the written notice was so provided and that the alien is removable . . . . 8 U.S.C. § 1229a(b)(5)(A). Paragraph (1) of § 1229(a) states that "written notice (in this section referred to as a 'notice to appear') shall be given . . . to the alien [in removal proceedings] . . . specifying . . . [t]he time and place at which the proceedings will be held." …
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