Immigration – removal — ineffective assistance

United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit

Civil

Immigration – removal — ineffective assistance

Where an alien seeking to reopen a removal order because of ineffective assistance of counsel did not notify the attorney, the motion was properly denied.

“The Board determined that although Marinov met two of the requirements, he did not comply with the notification-to-counsel requirement. Marinov asserts that he followed the procedures of the Illinois ARDC for attorney complaints and argues that this satisfied Lozada’s notification requirement. He maintains that attorneys are generally notified of complaints through the ARDC process. Even if this is correct, there is no indication that attorneys are always notified of a complaint, as evidenced by the ARDC procedures: ‘If we decide to investigate, our investigation generally includes sending a copy of the information that you provided to the lawyer being investigated. We will ask the lawyer to respond. Typically, the lawyer will send us his response about two to four weeks thereafter.’ http://www.iardc.org/ htr_filingarequest.html (last visited July 27, 2012). And as the Board observed, the notification requirement and the disciplinary complaint requirement are two separate and distinct requirements. See Patel v. Gonzales, 496 F.3d 829, 831-32 (7th Cir. 2007) (explaining the importance of Lozada’s two-step notification requirement).”

Petition Denied.

11-3643 Marinov v. Holder

Petition for Review of an of Order of the Board of Immigration Appeals, Tinder, J.