US immigration courtrooms are overburdened

June 19 2009 by Liam Clifford

US immigration courts backlogged

A study has been released that shows that US immigration courts are seriously overburdened and that the backlog in cases is at its highest point in a decade.

The report was published this week by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse and comes almost three years after the US Justice Department recommended that the government hire 40 extra judges to help ease the burden.

On 12 April 2009, the Justice Department revealed that only three additional judges had been hired in the past three years and that backlogs have risen by 19% over the same period, while the time it takes to resolve these cases has grown by 23%.

People who successfully applied for a US visa and are disputing a deportation order are having to wait longer than ever for their cases to be resolved. Moreover, an increasing number of cases are being referred to the courts as a result in a US immigration clamp-down instigated by the Bush Administration.

Although many thousands of people move to the US to start a new life each year, 351,477 cases were referred to the courts for investigation last year. People without the correct US visa documentation or those breaking the terms of their visa could find their cases joining the back of a very long queue.

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