Jaib Singh Ray v. Alberto R. Gonzales, Attorney General

Jaib Singh Ray, a native and citizen of India, seeks asylum in the United States. An immigration judge (IJ), however, denied Ray’s application for asylum, and the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) summarily affirmed the IJ’s decision because Ray failed to file a brief on appeal. Ray submitted to the BIA two motions to reopen his case, and the BIA denied both of these motions on procedural grounds. Ray now petitions for review of the BIA’s decision to deny his second motion to reopen.

We have jurisdiction to review the final order of the BIA under 8 U.S.C. § 1252 . We grant Ray’s petition, and we remand with instructions for the BIA to consider the merits of his first motion to reopen.

I.

Ray entered- the U.S. without inspection at Brownsville, Texas, on January 17,1997. Two months later, on March 17, 1997, Ray applied , for asylum. In June of 1998, he appeared with his attorney, Jang Im, from the Law Offices of Madan Ahluwalia, for a hearing on the merits of his asylum application. At his hearing, Ray testified in the Punjabi language through an interpreter. He claimed that he had experienced past persecution and feared future persecution at the hands of the Indian government…