CA7 on CIMT, False Use of SSN: Arias v. Lynch

Arias v. Lynch, Aug. 24, 2016- "We grant the petition and remand the case to the Board for further proceedings. Arias was convicted under a statute making it a federal crime to misrepresent a social security number to be one’s own “for any … purpose.” 42 U.S.C. § 408(a)(7)(B) (emphasis added). Many violations of that statute would amount to crimes involving moral turpitude. For both legal and pragmatic reasons, though, we doubt that every violation of the statute necessarily qualifies as a crime involving moral turpitude. 

We remand this case on two narrower grounds. First, the Board misapplied the framework for identifying crimes involving moral turpitude that it was bound to apply at the time of its decision. See Matter of Silva‐Trevino (Silva‐Trevino I), 24 I. & N. Dec. 687 (Att’y Gen. 2008) (establishing framework). Then, after the Board’s decision but before Arias’s petition for our review became ripe for decision, the Attorney General vacated the Silva‐Trevino I framework in its entirety. See Matter of Silva‐Trevino (Silva‐Trevino II), 26 I. & N. Dec. 550, 554 (Att’y Gen. 2015). Given the Board’s legal error and the current vacuum of authoritative guidance on how the Board should determine whether a crime involves moral turpitude, we remand to the Board to reconsider Arias’s case."

[Judge Posner's 12-page concurrence is priceless and must be read in its entirety.  Sample: "To prosecute and deport such a harmless person (to Ecuador, her country of origin) — indeed a productive resident of the United States — would be a waste of taxpayers’ money, but to deport her on the ground that her crime was one of moral turpitude would be downright ridiculous."  And the audio of the oral argument is simply delicious.  Hats off to Linda T. Coberly!]