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Brian Lehrer: It's the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. We'll talk now about getting deported and the rare instance of getting undeported from the United States. Maybe you heard the interesting, and in many ways, heartwarming story by WNYC public safety correspondent Matt Katz about a man named Lorenzo Charles who was brought here legally at six years old by his mother from Guyana, grew up as an American, but was deported back to Guyana to a country and culture he didn't know after being convicted of attempted robbery when he was 16, and attempted burglary when he was 20. Claimed he was innocent. Recently, 20 years later, after decisions by the Brooklyn DA's office and the federal government, Lorenzo Charles got undeported and he is back in what he considers his real hometown, Crown Heights, Brooklyn. We'll meet Lorenzo Charles live during this segment, but we'll also talk more generally about who gets deported and for what and who deserves undeportation with WNYC public safety correspondent Matt Katz, and another key player in Lorenzo Charles's story Lindsay Nash, co-director of the Immigration Justice Clinic at the Cardozo Law School here in the city. Hi, Matt and Professor Nash. Welcome to the live radio side of WNYC.

Matt Katz: Hi, Brian.

Lindsay Nash: Hi. Thanks for having us.

Brian Lehrer: Matt, what put you onto this story in the first place? The story of Lorenzo as an individual or the concept of undeportation?

Matt Katz: Yes, I heard from Lindsay Nash's clinic over at Cardozo Law School. They flagged this case for me because for many years, I covered immigration, I covered immigration detention. I had heard of isolated incidents of people being deported and then allowed back into the country. Maybe there was a mistake with their paperwork, maybe they filed an appeal that hadn't fully gone through yet. Very rare, but sometimes someone can be gone for a little while and come back. I had never heard of somebody being gone for two decades and continuing throughout that whole time to basically fight and research to figure out a way back in the country and then somehow being allowed back in. Once I heard about this, I knew I had to meet Lorenzo Charles and walk around his old neighborhood in Crown Heights and talk about how the neighborhood changed, how he had changed, how his community had changed, and also how things had remained the same. Just an extraordinary story of perseverance and demigration law. The reason why he was deported was because anybody who's a green card holder, a legal permanent resident who is convicted of a crime, can get kicked out of the country, and that's what happened to Lorenzo, but thanks to his attorneys who were able to get the Brooklyn DA's office to change those convictions, essentially, to agree to go before a judge and agree to the changes to those convictions. Then, the lawyers then went to the immigration authorities and got the Biden administration to reissue the green card and allow him back in. Just a very unusual, remarkable case.

Brian Lehrer: Professor Nash, any idea of the stats on how many deportations of legal immigrants take place from this country every year and the most common reasons?

Lindsay Nash: I don't have the stats on that right now, but people can get deported for all kinds of reasons. They could be deported because they don't have status if they came on a visa and overstayed or entered without authorization, or they can be people who have lawful status can become deportable because of something that happens that violates our immigration laws. That's how people can become deportable, but there's a range of factors that go into who actually gets deported, how the government is prioritizing people who comes onto the government's radar. I do have some recent stats on the charges that are brought against people who are put in removal proceedings recently, and the vast majority are people who had entered without authorization, and a relatively small number was based on alleged criminal activity like a conviction or something like that.

Brian Lehrer: Yes. As I say, Lorenzo will join us a little bit. We're the first-person account of some of his story, including how he's experiencing Brooklyn, not, according to Matt's reporting, 100% positive surprises [chuckles] on being back where he's tried to get back for 20 years. Professor Nash, let me take you one step further on what you were just saying. Why deportation as a punishment if you're here as a legal immigrant and you commit a crime? Why aren't you treated the same as a person born here convicted of the same crime? You serve your time or whatever the penalty is but they don't kick you out of what is now your home, but they do.

Lindsay Nash: Well, I can't really justify the practice, but our immigration laws for a long time have contained provisions that mean that someone who has lawful status, they tie deportation to certain kinds of criminal convictions. Even if someone has lawful status, they can become deportable because of certain kinds of criminal convictions even for relatively low-level offenses. I think the problem with this is that we know that there's a lot of problems with the criminal legal system that result in convictions for things that people didn't do and unduly severe charges, unconscionably long sentences, and so I think that this is really a problem with the immigration system, that it ties deportability to these convictions where we know that there's so much wrong with the criminal legal system that results in them. That was true in Lorenzo's case, his convictions were vacated on constitutional grounds. What happens in the deportation system is it takes those problems in the criminal legal system and compounds them because it imposes this penalty that, as the Supreme Court has said, may be the loss of all that makes life worth living as an additional consequence on top of any consequences imposed by the criminal legal system.

Brian Lehrer: What do you mean his deportation was reversed on constitutional grounds?

Lindsay Nash: Apologies. His convictions were vacated on constitutional grounds. The students in the clinic and visiting clinical assistant professor Mauricio Noroña really did a full-scale investigation of his convictions. They found that they were deeply, deeply flawed. He received ineffective assistance of counsel, his attorney didn't do the investigation that he should have, didn't contact witnesses, and so the students and Mauricio really did that full-scale investigation to show that the convictions themselves violated the constitution. Given all the hurdles that Lorenzo faced while he was going through the process, he simply wasn't in a position to be able to make those claims for himself, and yet he was deported even despite the fact that his convictions were so flawed.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, anybody else have a story of battling deportation for yourself or someone you know and also to discuss what the standard should be if you want to bring that up in a phone call if you are here legally, which is a situation in Lorenzo Charles's case, so we'll talking mostly about this? If you are here legally and you commit a crime, should deportation even be the penalty as opposed to getting sentenced like anyone else who lives here and does the same thing? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. With us briefly now is Lorenzo Charles, the subject of Matt Katz's story. Lorenzo, thanks for giving us a few minutes. Welcome to the live radio side of WNYC.

Lorenzo Charles: Thank you. Good morning.

Brian Lehrer: First, to go way back, coming here from Guyana at six years old in 1983, do you remember why your family came and how they wound up in Brooklyn?

Lorenzo Charles: I believe my family came because it was for a better way of living. At the time, I believe things were hard in Guyana and I believe my mom and my family migrated here because America had way better opportunities.

Brian Lehrer: You came here legally, but part of your story is kind of like the DACA story for undocumented immigrants who were brought here by their parents as kids, they don't know Mexico, they don't know Venezuela, they don't know whatever country they were born in, they grew up as Americans, and that becomes a factor in policymaking. That's why they got the exemptions first. When you realized in your 20s that you might get deported to a place you didn't grow up in, how did that make you think about your identity?

Lorenzo Charles: Honestly, at the time, I kept it to myself because I felt like no one would understand and I would be judged wrongfully. I would be seen like an immigrant as opposed to someone who grew up with you, who went to the same school with you, who was in the same classes, who shared the same experiences.

Brian Lehrer: When you got back to Guyana, under those circumstances, what was it like to be there? What seemed familiar or unfamiliar to you?

Lorenzo Charles: When I got back to Guyana, there wasn't anything familiar. It was like nothing I ever expected. The only thing that I had reflecting of America was my peers who had gotten deported prior to me. They came and they got me integrated into society within the first few days.

Brian Lehrer: I see from Matt's story that now that you're back in Brooklyn, things look worse to you in some ways than you remember from 20 years ago. You're seeing crime, you're seeing rats. Are there good things and bad things about being here compared to being in Guyana or in Suriname where I see you also spent some time now that you're actually back?

Lorenzo Charles: Everything is beautiful. Everything is great. The situations with the rats and the crime, that's not comforting. That's something ugly, but that exists in all societies and it exists in the places that I've been. That doesn't throw me off much as far as appreciating being back here and appreciating just being around my family freely, around my friends, being able to meet people, being able to have a good job with great people, and make an impact in people's lives. Those things, they way more outweigh the small things such as the situation with the rats plaguing the city, the overall situation with crime.

Brian Lehrer: Last question for you. I see you're in college full-time now and you're interested in becoming a lawyer yourself to help other people who've been deported. What kinds of people with what kinds of stories do you have in mind?

Lorenzo Charles: Excuse me. Can you just repeat that last part? I didn't hear you clearly.

Brian Lehrer: Yes. I read in Matt's story that you're in college full-time now and you're interested in becoming a lawyer yourself to help other people who've been deported. I'm just curious if there are certain kinds of people with certain kinds of situations who you most have in mind who you would like to represent?

Lorenzo Charles: Well, I spent close to two years in immigration initially fighting my case, and then most of my time deported, I was privileged to know a lot of other deportees like myself. A lot of the stories are different but the root is the same. I really want to help people like myself who was educated and raised in this culture, in this society, and this is all they know, and then just because they commit a crime just like someone else who's born here, who acquired citizenship, that their penalty has an extra burden and an extra sentence to it, and that's deportation. For some reason, I don't believe that's fair, and that's something that I really want to focus on. Those are the type of people that I'd really like to help.

Brian Lehrer: Lorenzo Charles, thanks for coming on with us. Best of luck to you and your family.

Lorenzo Charles: Thank you very much.

Brian Lehrer: Professor Nash, maybe he'll work for you someday at the Cardozo Law School Immigration Clinic. Is there a typical kind of undeportation case that you work on there, or is it so rare to get undeported that it doesn't come up much?

Lindsay Nash: Well, I can say I don't have the statistics but our experience is that it's extraordinarily rare. Even after we got Lorenzo's removal proceedings reopened and his status restored, we couldn't find people who could tell us how to go through the nuts and bolts of just physically getting him back here. I heard one person who has extensive experience with the immigration describe it as almost impossible, but it shouldn't be. As Lorenzo was saying, there are so many people who've had situations like his, people who should never have been ordered deported in the first place. There are some incredible advocates here in the United States working to bring people back. There's been some really great successes that they've had. I would hope that the government would work to create better policies and better more transparent pathways to allow people to come back to particularly where their deportations and their criminal cases have been so flawed in the first place. I can only hope that I'd get the chance to work with Lorenzo on these kinds of cases because he was an incredible partner on this, and that's something that we've seen in other folks that we've talked to who've been through these processes, that they're incredible partners in trying to unravel the flaws that led to their deportations.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take a phone call. Keith in the Bronx, you're on WNYC. Hi, Keith. Thank you for calling in.

Kenneth: Hi, Brian. Sorry, my name's Kenneth. Not sure if you can hear me.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, I'm sorry. I can hear you. Sorry, I had it as Keith. I apologize. Hi, Kenneth.

Kenneth: No worries. No worries. I'm going to be 38 in July. This is actually a very emotional topic for me. My father was deported when I was about eight or nine years old. Both my parents were immigrants from Kenya. That has been an extremely traumatic event. My father was the kind of sole breadwinner in our family, took a family of five, and after his arrest and deportation, my younger brother, sister, and I were raised by a single mom. Now I'm a dad. I have three daughters of my own. It's very expensive to get a family of five on a plane across the Atlantic. My heart breaks that my children will never be able to possibly hug their grandfather. I guess I grew up as a child impacted by immigration enforcement, and I just wanted to thank Lorenzo for sharing his story about regardless of the crime or the rats, spending time with family means the world for people, especially children who've lost a parent or whose connections to wherever home may be seem like a chasm in a world. I just want to thank you for just taking some time to shed light on this issue and topic. I've never shared this with many people, let alone publicly on public radio, but thank you for taking my call.

Brian Lehrer: Kenneth, I really appreciate your courage on that. Thank you very much. Let's go on to Ibrahim in East Orange. You're on WNYC. Hi, Ibrahim.

Ibrahim: Hi, Brian. Thank you very much for picking up my call, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: You're very welcome, and I hope there's not a fire in the background there. I hear the sirens.

Ibrahim: No, I just pulled over to the park so that I could talk to you, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: You have a story.

Ibrahim: Yes, I do have a story. My name is Ibrahim. I'm originally from Ghana. I've been in the country for almost eight years. Initially, I came in as [unintelligible 00:17:54] student, went back and came as a B1, B2. Then, I finally met a beautiful lady that we got married in 2017. In 2018, she decided like, "You know what? It's about time you adjust your status and we go ahead and make life easier for ourselves." Somewhere along the line, we filled out the application and everything went through. I think somewhere 2016, just a year in the country, I had an encounter with the police. I didn't know the laws. I was very naive about the law. Fast forward 2018, when I went for the interview, the immigration officer asked me, "What happened? Have you ever been arrested?" I said, "No." Then, she repeated the question again. I said, "Oh, yes." At the time when I was arrested, I had my brother's passport card with me because I was living with him and he had asked me to grab the passport card and bring it to him. The police assumed I was my brother. I didn't even know what was-- He just took the information, tell me to go. Then, the next minute they sent paperwork and then he came in. The consequences [unintelligible 00:18:59] was a one-year probation, and after that, everything was gone. I went to immigration for an interview, and the immigration officer denied me my adjustment of status. I filed for 290B. That was an appeal to the denial of the adjustment of status.

Brian Lehrer: Ibrahim, just for time purposes, because we're going to run out of time in the segment soon, were you convicted of a crime at any point and so they're trying to deny you legal status here on that basis?

Ibrahim: Yes. They denied me a legal status on that basis. 2020, I was arrested by [unintelligible 00:19:39] and I filed for adjustment of status, even though I have the 290B, the [unintelligible 00:19:45] decided to keep me in detention for eight good months.

Brian Lehrer: Wow.

Ibrahim: When I filed, they just transferred the whole case from [unintelligible 00:19:53] to the immigration judge. The immigration judge, there has been so much vague laws, and so much power has been given to the immigration judges that they just deny based on how they feel about you. The judge denied me based on this question, nothing else but this question. There was no particular issue that was being given to say, "Oh, I deny because of biases that-- You corroborated all your story, everything looks good, but I'm denying you based on my discretion."

Brian Lehrer: Right. That's really interesting. Professor Nash, I think Ibrahim is reaching out for help and knows that you from the Cardoza Immigration Clinic are here, and that's kind of why he called. I don't know if you can offer him any general advice, I realize you can't have a client relationship on the radio, but any general advice? What about that issue that he raised that a judge can use discretion as opposed to a particular point of law to keep somebody either in immigration detention or just to refuse them legal status?

Lindsay Nash: I'm happy to talk to him separately about his case. These cases are so complicated, there's a lot of information that an attorney or someone typically needs to be able to be really helpful, which is part of the reason why it's so difficult because lots of times folks don't have attorneys and they don't have a right to representation in these proceedings, but I do think two of the issues that he raised are really important. One is the fact that by applying for some form of status, lots of times people put themselves at risk of being put into removal proceedings. Maybe they're not on ICE's radar, but by applying for something, they can get referred to removal proceedings and they can face deportation. There's a really big risk there in simply trying to regularize your status for folks who don't have status.

Brian Lehrer: Even married to a US citizen, which he says he is.

Lindsay Nash: Yes. ICE can refer a person to removal proceedings, I've had a client who applied to naturalize, and he got put into removal proceedings because of a conviction. There is a risk there. People should understand what that risk is before deciding to apply for something. They should go in eyes wide open that they need to be aware of that if they have a conviction or something that could make them deportable or if they lack status to begin with. The other thing I would just say is that immigration judges do have a lot of discretion in different kinds of cases. If somebody is deportable, that is a legal determination that they would make, but lots of applications for relief, meaning an application where somebody may say, "Yes, I'm deportable, I'm removable, but I should be allowed to stay here anyway," there's different kinds of applications for relief that allow them to do that. Many of those forms of relief have some kind of discretionary components so that the immigration judge makes a discretionary determination as well in deciding whether they should be allowed to stay. That is a real and significant aspect of trying to defend against deportation and immigration proceedings.

Brian Lehrer: Ibrahim, hang on, we're going to take your contact information off the air because I think you offered to talk to him. We'll see if we can make that match for at least one conversation off the air. Ibrahim, if you want to share it, feel free, and we'll give it to Professor Nash. Let me get one more call in here. Nan in Brooklyn is a sociology professor who is relating to Lorenzo's story about going back to a country that he didn't grow up in as a result of his deportation. Nan, you're on WNYC, we have about a minute for you.

Nan: Okay. I'm a cross-cultural psychologist and I study return migration. Thousands of people return to their home countries. Many voluntarily, clearly, Lorenzo was not voluntary, but the psychological problems of returning home, of not being accepted by the people who see you, as in this case, American, it's a problem in terms of your identity and adjustment, and he's had a double return migration issue in that, after 20 years, he returned to the US. I heard from the piece yesterday about the sense of nostalgia he had while he was in Guyana about what it was like back in Brooklyn. Now he's facing the reality of life here as well, but fortunately, he has family to help him with his double adjustment.

Brian Lehrer: Nan, thank you for that. Matt Katz, we'll give you the last word in this segment. It is kind of culture shock twice in his life, right?

Matt Katz: Yes, absolutely, but he just feels much more comfortable in Brooklyn. My final word on this is that we heard this term family separation during the Trump administration about separating kids from their parents at the border, but family separation is involved in all kinds of immigration enforcement. Lorenzo talked about landing at JFK and seeing a sister he hadn't seen in 20 years, of seeing nieces and nephews he had never been in "the same physical world with". We heard that from the callers too about the man whose father was deported, and I think that's what struck me so deeply about his story.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, you can hear Matt Katz's story of the rare case of undeportation at wnyc.org or read the print edition at gothamist.com. Lindsey Nash, co-director of the Immigration Justice Clinic at the Cardozo Law School here in the city, thank you so much for joining us and lending your expertise. Thank you both.

Lindsay Nash: Thank you.

Matt Katz: Thanks, Brian.

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