Nubia Gutierrez is a domestic violence survivor. She reported her assailant to the police and cooperated with authorities, necessary steps to become eligible for a special form of immigration relief known as a U visa, intended to protect victims of abuse and violence by allowing them to stay in the United States. But a California sheriff still refused to certify her visa application.
“I reported my circumstances to the police to escape the violence,” Gutierrez said. “Even though I participated in the investigation in a way that made me eligible for the U-visa, the Sheriff of San Joaquin denied me the certification without an explanation. I wanted that protection, not just for me, but more for my children.”
Her story of being denied a potentially life-saving visa regularly takes place across the country. Most recently in North Carolina, a local prosecutor refused to sign off on a U visa certification because he believed that U visas were “never intended to protect Latinos from Latinos.”
The process by which applicants are granted or denied these visas was dubbed “geography roulette” by a 2013 University of North Carolina study because some immigrants are denied signatures at higher rates depending on where they live.
A Department of Homeland Security certification resource guide for law enforcement indicates that agencies have “the discretion” to establish policies and procedures regarding U visa certifications. And local law enforcement officials hold a lot of power during the certification process: in some municipalities, some officials strongly oppose signing off on certification forms.
Congress created the U visa program through the Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act of 2000 to encourage victims of violence to assist in the investigation or prosecution of a crime. The U visa lasts for four years and visa holders can apply for lawful permanent resident status after three years of continuous presence in the United States.
A completed U visa application requires immigrants to include a Certification of Victim Helpfulness form known as the I-918B, to be signed by law enforcement, a state or local agency, a judge, or any other authorities “that have responsibility for the detection or investigation or prosecution of qualifying crimes,” the bill indicated. Signing the I-918B application won’t confer legal status, but the signatures are needed as part of a victim’s petition to meet eligibility requirements and cannot be sent otherwise. Once the application is certified with a signature, it’s sent to the USCIS, which reviews the case and makes a full determination.
Only 10,000 U visas are allotted annually and the quota has been met every year for the past six years. There is such a high demand that the USCIS stopped processing applications that came after December 2013.
Respondents to the University of North Carolina study found about 165 agencies located in 35 states that refuse to certify the application form “under any circumstances.” The report found six municipalities — Gwinnett County, Georgia; Rockingham County, North Carolina; Dallas, Texas; South Sioux City, Nebraska; Riverside, California; and McClennan County, Texas — in which “all or almost all certifying agencies in the jurisdiction have a blanket policy against certifying applications.”
The so-called “geography roulette” occurs in big cities as well. Up until 2012, the New York Police Department was “reluctant” to sign off on U visa certifications, only verifying 56 percent of applications between 2009 and 2012. “By comparison, the Oakland Police Department in California has signed 1,201 applications … or 95 percent” over the same time period, a NBC affiliate investigation found. At the time, the NYPD designated the commissioner as the sole person to verify whether immigrants had cooperated. Now two other police officials can be part of the verification process.
A 2014 Reuters report analyzing the number of certifications among jurisdictions of similar size found that Sacramento, California, which has a higher population than Oakland, verified 300 applications between 2009 and 2014. Meanwhile, Los Angeles, CA, which has a population less than half of New York’s population verified 4,585 applications between 2009 and 2014.
Reuters reported at the time, “in some jurisdictions, law enforcement is split: Police may refuse to certify crime victims, while prosecutors will sign off, meaning that only those victims whose cases result in arrest and prosecution can apply for the visa, though that is not a requirement under the law.”
That’s the case in Kern County where Sheriff Donny Youngblood has “largely refused to sign paperwork that immigrant crime victims need to apply for U visas,” the Los Angeles Times reported. In a letter addressed to Youngblood, the American Civil Liberties Union wrote, “These individuals suffered heinous crimes, ranging from human trafficking, to violent assault, to rape and sexual assault. Many of them not only met the legal standards for U visa certification, but they met your own stated criteria — their lives were put at risk by the crime they suffered and they were cooperating with an ongoing investigation — but yet you refused to sign their certification forms, thereby preventing them from applying for a U-visa.” The ACLU also cited two instances of immigrant assault victims whose applications were rejected by Youngblood.
Things are getting better in Kern County, however. Kern County District Attorney Melissa Allen established the Family Violence Unit last month to allow a “more comprehensive review” of the I-918B form “required to begin the U visa process,” the Kern Golden Empire reported.
And last month, Gutierrez received support from a California state Senate committee, which unanimously approved a public safety bill that would require law enforcement officials and prosecutors to sign certifications for U visas.