- Title: [SW News](Associated Press) Judge Stays Out of Immigration
Case of 17-year-old boy fighting deportation to Somalia
- From:[]
- Date :[February 18, 2000 , 13:58 EST]
Judge Stays Out of
Immigration Case Associated Press , Friday , February 18, 2000 , 13:58 EST By CATHERINE
WILSON Associated Press Writer MIAMI
(AP) -- Confronting one of the same legal issues of the center
of the Elian Gonzalez case, a federal judge refused on Friday to get involved in the case
of 17-year-oldboy fighting deportation to Somalia. U.S. District Judge Alan Gold ruled he
lacks jurisdiction to help the teen-ager, who is known in court only as Abdul and claims
to know of no relatives left alive in his homeland. Abdul had asked thejudge to order that
his case be heard in state court. The judge said that even if he had legal authority to
intervene, the Immigration and Naturalization Service acted properly in deciding to send
the teen-agerback to Somalia despite his fears about returning. The question of
jurisdiction also figures in Elian's case, which will be argued on Tuesday before a
different federal judge. Abdul flew into Miami by himself on Dec. 23. He has said that he
and his father were separated from his mother and two brothers by war in1990, and he told
INS officials he saw his father killed by bandits in 1996. He wanted a state court to
declare him a ward of the state and let him remain in the United States on the grounds of
abandonment by his parents. But federalprosecutors argued that allowing anyone but the INS
to decide the boy's future would ``thwart the intent of Congress." Cheryl Little, one
of Abdul's lawyers, said that because of Friday's ruling -- and because Abdul turns on 18
on Saturday -- he will have to pursue a political asylum claim instead, the usual route
taken by adults who arrive in this country. ``It's a much higher burden," Little
said. ``It's much more difficult for him to win his case because he has to prove he has a
well-founded fear of persecution upon his return to Somalia." After the ruling, an
INS dentist examined Abdul and concluded from his teeth thathe is an adult already subject
to INS rules governing them. Abdul was allowed to get his belongings from a juvenile
center where he had been staying and was transferred to an INS detention center for
adults. Mariano Faget, an INS official arrested Thursday on suspicion of being a Cuban
spy, was the one who denied Abdul's requests to remain in this country. But the judge said
the arrest had no bearing on Abdul's case.
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