Victorino Mendoza-Ortiz v. U.S. Attorney General


USCA11 Case: 21-12438 Document: 32-1 Date Filed: 03/15/2023 Page: 1 of 13 [DO NOT PUBLISH] In the United States Court of Appeals For the Eleventh Circuit ____________________ No. 21-12438 Non-Argument Calendar ____________________ VICTORINO MENDOZA-ORTIZ, Petitioner, versus U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL, Respondent. ____________________ Petitions for Review of a Decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals Agency No. A075-574-909 ____________________ USCA11 Case: 21-12438 Document: 32-1 Date Filed: 03/15/2023 Page: 2 of 13 2 Opinion of the Court 21-12438 ____________________ No. 22-10335 Non-Argument Calendar ____________________ VICTORINO MENDOZA-ORTIZ, Petitioner, versus U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL, Respondent. ____________________ Petitions for Review of a Decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals Agency No. A075-574-909 ____________________ Before ROSENBAUM, JILL PRYOR, and ED CARNES, Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM: USCA11 Case: 21-12438 Document: 32-1 Date Filed: 03/15/2023 Page: 3 of 13 21-12438 Opinion of the Court 3 Victorina Mendoza-Ortiz did not appear at his removal hear- ing. The government presented clear and convincing evidence that he was removable, and an IJ ordered him removed in absentia. See 8 U.S.C. § 1229a(b)(5)(C)(ii). In two consolidated petitions, he seeks review of two orders of the Board of Immigration Appeals, the first of which affirmed the immigration judge’s denial of Men- doza-Ortiz’s third motion to reopen and rescind the IJ’s in absentia order of removal, and the second of which denied reconsideration of its order affirming the IJ. Mendoza-Ortiz’s challenge is based on the technicalities of notice. He contends that he is entitled to rescission of his in absentia removal order because his initial notice to appear violated statu- tory requirements by failing to include information about the time and date of the removal hearing. See 8 U.S.C. § 1229a(b)(5)(C)(ii). He admits that he received actual notice of the time and place of his hearing in a later issued notice that included that information. But he argues that is not enough because the statute requires the inclusion of that information in the initial notice to appear. I. Mendoza-Ortiz is a native and citizen of Guatemala who en- tered the United States without inspection on or about December 13, 1998. That same day, a Border Patrol Agent personally served Mendoza with a notice to appear (NTA) charging him as remova- ble under 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(6)(A)(i) for being a non-United States citizen present in the United States without being admitted or pa- roled. The NTA did not contain the date or time of his removal USCA11 Case: 21-12438 Document: 32-1 Date Filed: 03/15/2023 Page: 4 of 13 4 Opinion of the Court 21-12438 hearing. Instead it ordered Mendoza-Ortiz to appear before an IJ in El Paso, Texas at a date and time “[t]o [b]e [s]et” in the future and warned him of the consequences of failing to appear. On January 27, 1999, the immigration court mailed Men- doza-Ortiz a notice of hearing, which stated that his hearing had been set for April 14, 1999, in Miami, Florida. Mendoza-Ortiz did not appear at the hearing, and the IJ ordered him removed in ab- sentia to Guatemala based …

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Source: All recent Immigration Decisions In All the U.S. Courts of Appeals