Immigration Crackdown: Decisions benched by delays on Denver's overloaded U.S. Immigration Court

A look at the overwhelmed immigration court in Denver, Colorado

Decisions benched by delays on Denver's overloaded U.S. Immigration Court - The Denver Post: "Eleven Spanish-speaking men rise reluctantly from wooden benches in the U.S. Immigration Court in Denver. On instructions from a court interpreter, they raise their right hands and in unison they swear to tell la verdad, the truth.

They are instructed to seek attorneys to help them navigate a deportation process steeped in its own complicated language of 42Bs, 204(g)s, I-130s and 240Bs. They are collectively told to return to this court — one of the most overloaded in the country — on the same day of the month and time seven months from now.

Even with this time-saving group approach to judicial process, each will wait 501 days on average to have a full hearing on his case.

The U.S. Department of Justice Executive Office for Immigration Review's Denver-based court is slogging through 7,200 pending cases, putting it in the nation's top 10 for overloaded immigration courts.

It's a dubious distinction that the state can't fix and the federal government isn't doing anything about."