Woodby v. IMMIGRATION & NATURALIZATION SERVICE, 15637.
| Decision Date | 16 September 1965 |
| Docket Number | No. 15637.,15637. |
| Citation | 370 F.2d 989 |
| Parties | Elizabeth Rosalia WOODBY, Petitioner, v. IMMIGRATION & NATURALIZATION SERVICE, Respondent. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit |
Sidney G. Kusworm and Jacob A. Myers, Dayton, Ohio, for petitioner, Kusworm & Myers, Dayton, Ohio, on the brief.
Charles G. Heyd, Asst. U. S. Atty., Cincinnati, Ohio, for respondent, Joseph P. Kinneary, U. S. Atty., Cincinnati, Ohio, on the brief.
Before MILLER, O'SULLIVAN, and PHILLIPS, Circuit Judges.
O'SULLIVAN, Circuit Judge.
The Special Inquiry Officer conducted a hearing pursuant to 8 U.S.C.A. § 1252, at which testimony was taken and petitioner was represented by counsel. Petitioner and three other witnesses testified at such hearing and affidavits of petitioner and another obtained upon prehearing investigation were received in evidence. The inquiry officer found that petitioner had engaged in prostitution as charged and ordered that she be deported. Petitioner concedes that she did engage in prostitution, but claims that she did so while acting under duress which arose from the circumstances hereinafter set forth.
On January 8, 1955, petitioner Woodby, a native of Hungary and a citizen of Germany, married an American soldier then in service in Germany. Two children were born of the marriage. The first, a girl, was born in Germany and the second, a boy, was born prematurely in the United States on August 13, 1956. Petitioner was admitted to the United States on February 7, 1956, and went to live with her husband and daughter at the home of her husband's parents in Harlan, Kentucky. A few months later petitioner and her husband moved to Dayton, Ohio, where the second child was born. Petitioner's infant daughter was then living with her paternal grandparents in Kentucky. It is clear from the evidence that petitioner's husband gave little attention to the support and care of his wife and children.
Petitioner and her husband and the new born son lived for a time in Dayton until, as claimed by petitioner, the husband left her in early 1957, taking the son with him, and presumably took up residence in Harlan, Kentucky, with his parents and children. The husband was killed in an automobile accident about July 14, 1957.
It was after her husband left her that petitioner entered into the practice of prostitution. Her account of the facts which she claims made such conduct the product of duress is as follows.
While working to support herself, and about April 1, 1957 (later changed to February 7, 1957), she got a telephone call from her husband, who told her that their infant son was seriously ill and needed an operation that would cost $300.00. He stated that he had no money or Blue Cross insurance and requested her to provide the needed cash. The next day while petitioner was alone in her apartment contemplating her plight and crying, fearful that her son would die unless she could get the money for his operation, a vacuum cleaner salesman came to her apartment. Observing petitioner's apparent state of anxiety, this man asked the cause and told her he could help her get the money. He left momentarily and shortly returned with another man and a bottle of whiskey. After petitioner had consumed some whiskey, this vacuum cleaner salesman and part-time panderer proposed that he would lend petitioner the needed money to be repaid with her earnings as a prostitute from customers he would procure. She was importuned to disrobe and have some pictures taken in the nude, presumably to aid the procurer to attract business to her. Petitioner thereupon began the regular practice of prostitution, carrying it on in addition to her employment as a waitress. She continued in this enterprise until she had earned enough to and did repay the loan. She testified that she ceased her life as a prostitute about July 1, 1957 (later changed to early April, 1957), and went to Tennessee, later to return to Dayton with a woman friend. She stated that she did not thereafter engage in prostitution, although she admitted to continuing sexual relations with a man whose first meeting with her was to keep a prostitution engagement.
A very confused record ends its identification of petitioner's activities with the latter part of the year 1958. What occurred between then and the immigration authorities' investigation of her in about the middle of 1961 is not revealed. The record suggests some effort on petitioner's part to regain custody of her children from her husband's parents, but the record is silent as to the outcome. The record is likewise silent as to how and why the immigration authorities became interested in petitioner at least three years after, as far as the record before us discloses, she discontinued activities as a prostitute. We have been told nothing as to the legal custody of petitioner's children, except for the observation in the decision of the Special Inquiry Officer that "since her citizen children are now in the legal custody of respondent (sic) father-and mother-in-law, there is no basis for...
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