Cuevas-Gaspar

BACKGROUND

Petitioner Enrique Cuevas-Gaspar (“Cuevas-Gaspar”) is a 21-year-old native and citizen of Mexico. He was admitted to the United States as a lawful permanent resident on December 4, 1997. Cuevas-Gaspar asserts that he entered the United States with his parents in 1985, when he was one year old, and that his mother attained permanent resident status in 1990, when Cuevas-Gaspar was seven years old.

On October 16, 2002, Cuevas-Gaspar pled guilty in Wash- ington Superior Court to the offense of being an accomplice to residential burglary, in violation of Washington Revised Code §§ 9A.52.025(1) and 9A.08.020(3). The Statement of Defendant on Plea of Guilty requires the defendant to state “in 1 The immigration judge assumed that there was no issue of fact as to whether Cuevas-Gaspar resided in the United States prior to attainment of legal permanent resident status. 15816 CUEVAS-GASPAR v. GONZALES [his] own words, what [he] did that makes [him] guilty of this crime.” In the guilty plea statement, Cuevas-Gaspar responded: “On March 13, 2002, in Yakima County, I helped another person take property without permission from a resi- dence where no one was home.” He…