United States v. Vasquez

• Decision Date: 11 June 2021
• Docket Number: No. 20-40332,20-40332
• Citation: 1 F.4th 355
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff—Appellant, v. Arnoldo Antonio VASQUEZ, Defendant—Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

1 F.4th 355

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff—Appellant,

v.Arnoldo Antonio VASQUEZ, Defendant—Appellee.

No. 20-40332

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

FILED June 11, 2021

Anthony Daniel Bianco, Esq., Trial Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Immigration Litigation - District Court Section, Washington, DC, for Plaintiff-Appellant.

Joshua Turin, Esq., Marc Esquenazi, Turin & Esquenazi, P.L.L.C., Dallas, TX, for Defendant-Appellee.

Before Owen, Chief Judge, and Jolly and Dennis, Circuit Judges.

Per Curiam:

Arnoldo Antonio Vasquez, a former Salvadorian military officer, is now a naturalized American citizen. Based on his role in extrajudicial killings and a subsequent cover-up occurring during armed conflict in El Salvador, the government seeks to revoke his citizenship, that is, to denaturalize him. The district court conducted a three-day bench trial and declined to cancel Vasquez's American citizenship. The district court erred. Although he may have refused to actually shoot civilians, we find that the former officer "assisted" and "participated in the commission of" extrajudicial killings during the Salvadorian Civil War, rendering him statutorily ineligible to assume the "high privilege" of American citizenship. 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(3)(E)(iii) ; Chaunt v. United States , 364 U.S. 350, 357, 81 S.Ct. 147, 5 L.Ed.2d 120 (1960) (Clark, J., dissenting). We therefore REVERSE and REMAND.

I.

Arnoldo Antonio Vasquez served as an officer in the Salvadorian military during the brutal civil war that took place in El Salvador between 1980 and 1991.¹ On September 20, 1988, Vasquez's superiors gave Vasquez the names and addresses of alleged members of a rebel group to capture near the town of San Sebastian. Armed and ready, Vasquez and his soldiers traveled to the town and did as they were told.

After the alleged rebels had been captured, a major who was second-in-command of the entire battalion ordered one of the detainees to be killed. Two of Vasquez's superiors refused to comply with the order and requested it in writing because they believed it to be illegal. The major then skipped over these intermediate officers and contacted Vasquez directly, repeating his order and stating he would come to San Sebastian to "conduct an investigation." Vasquez testified that at this point, he knew the major planned to kill all of the detainees and had no intention of conducting an investigation. This understanding was further confirmed by the fact that the major had also ordered one of the detainees to be dressed in black clothing so that he would appear to be a member of a rebel group.

Knowing that the major was coming and planned to execute the detainees, Vasquez nevertheless had his soldiers dress one of the detainees in black clothes. The major arrived, ordered the capture of additional individuals, and then ordered all of the detainees to be executed—ten innocent civilians in total. Vasquez's soldiers proceeded to kill the detainees by staging a fake ambush: they lined up the detainees in a road, set off explosives and fired their weapons to make battle noises (and seriously wound the detainees), and then finished off the detainees at point-blank range.

Vasquez, without corroborating evidence, claims that he refused to comply with the major's order to participate in the staged ambush. But Vasquez admits that he saw his soldiers preparing for the staged ambush, knew it was happening, and was relatively close by as the detainees were murdered.

After the killings, the major instructed Vasquez to say that the detainees had been killed during a skirmish following an ambush, which was a lie. Vasquez repeated this lie to his soldiers to make sure that they knew the cover-up story. He repeated this lie again to a Salvadorian military commission charged with investigating the incident, which had come to be known as the San Sebastian Massacre. Eventually, when Vasquez found out that he was to be blamed for the massacre, he told the commission the truth.

Investigative proceedings continued for several years before the military commission and in Salvadorian courts. Vasquez was first identified as having potentially carried out the killings alongside his men but was later acquitted by a court of the crime of intentional homicide. An appellate court upheld his acquittal. During this time, however, the Salvadorian military continued to threaten and murder potential witnesses, and even judges, to prevent civilian courts from holding the military accountable. After the civil war ended, the United Nations Commission on the Truth for El Salvador specifically found that Vasquez transmitted the major's order to "designate some soldiers to finish off the victims" of the massacre. It further found that he "provided the necessary materials to activate" the explosives that were used in the fake ambush.

Over a decade after the massacre, Vasquez applied and was approved for a visa to come to this country. Several years after that, in 2004, he sought to become a naturalized American citizen. His application was approved, and in January 2005, Vasquez took the oath of allegiance and became a United States citizen. But in 2017, the government brought this denaturalization suit against Vasquez, alleging that he failed to meet statutory requirements for citizenship at the time of his naturalization and that he procured his citizenship illegally. After a three-day bench trial, the district court found that the government had not met its burden of proof. The government appeals.

II.

The Constitution authorizes Congress to "establish a uniform Rule of Naturalization." U.S. CONST. art. I, § 8, cl. 4. That power bestows the ability to create rules regarding both the requirements for citizenship and the potential consequences for failing to meet those requirements—even if discovered after citizenship has already been conferred. See United States v. Mandycz , 447 F.3d 951, 956 (6th Cir. 2006) (Sutton, J.). These consequences include denaturalization.

Congress has stated that "[n]o person" may become a citizen "unless such applicant ... has been and still is a person of good moral character." 8 U.S.C. § 1427(a)(3). A person cannot "be regarded as, or found to be, a person of good moral character" if that person "at any time" has "committed, ordered, incited, assisted, or otherwise participated in the commission of ... any extrajudicial killing." 8 U.S.C. § 1101(f)(9) ; 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(3)(E)(iii). Lest the meaning of "extrajudicial killing" be unclear, Congress defined the term as "a deliberated killing not authorized by a previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples." Torture Victim Protection Act of 1991, Pub. L. No. 102-256, § 3(a), 106 Stat. 73, 73 (1992).

For over a century, the Supreme Court has recognized that "no alien has the slightest right to naturalization unless all statutory requirements are complied with." United States v. Ginsberg , 243 U.S. 472, 475, 37 S.Ct. 422, 61 L.Ed. 853 (1917). If a person manages to become a citizen despite not meeting Congress's requirements, his citizenship is "illegally procured." Id. And since "every certificate of citizenship must be treated as granted upon condition that the government may challenge it," the government may "demand [the] cancellation" of illegally procured citizenship that was not "issued in accordance with [Congress's] requirements." Id.

The authorization and procedures for revoking a naturalized American's citizenship who failed to comply with congressionally imposed conditions for acquiring that citizenship are found in 8 U.S.C. § 1451(a). This statute empowers the government to initiate a civil suit to "revok[e] and set[ ] aside" any order admitting a person as a citizen and "cancel [his] certificate of naturalization" if proven that his citizenship was "illegally procured." 8 U.S.C. § 1451(a) ; Fedorenko v. United States , 449 U.S. 490, 506, 101 S.Ct. 737, 66 L.Ed.2d 686 (1981). As described above, "a naturalized citizen's failure to comply with the statutory prerequisites for naturalization renders his certificate of citizenship revocable as ‘illegally procured’ under 8 U.S.C. § 1451(a)." Id. at 514, 101 S.Ct. 737.

A denaturalization suit, however, is not "an ordinary civil action since it involves an important adjudication of status." Schneiderman v. United States , 320 U.S. 118, 160, 63 S.Ct. 1333, 87 L.Ed. 1796 (1943). To take away a person's American citizenship is an "extraordinarily severe" penalty: "[d]enaturalization consequences may be more grave than consequences that flow from conviction for crimes." Klapprott v. United States , 335 U.S. 601, 611–12, 69 S.Ct. 384, 93 L.Ed. 266 (1949). Because "[r]ights once conferred should not be lightly revoked," the government must meet an "exacting standard" to denaturalize a citizen, proving its charges by "clear, unequivocal, and convincing evidence." Id. at 612, 69 S.Ct. 384 ; Schneiderman , 320 U.S. at 125, 63 S.Ct. 1333. This burden is "substantially identical with that required in criminal cases" because the "objective sought" and the "gravity of the consequences" are not "so different as to justify adoption of a different standard." Kungys v. United States , 485 U.S. 759, 770–71, 108 S.Ct. 1537, 99 L.Ed.2d 839 (1988) ; Klapprott , 335 U.S. at 612, 69 S.Ct. 384. The facts and the law should be construed "as far as is reasonably possible" in favor of the citizen. Schneiderman , 320 U.S. at 122, 63 S.Ct. 1333.

III.

We thus come to the central question: whether Vasquez, in connection with the San Sebastian Massacre, "committed, ordered, incited, assisted, or otherwise participated in the commission of" an extrajudicial killing? If the government has satisfied this standard by "clear, unequivocal, and convincing evidence," then Vasquez cannot be, as statutorily defined, a "person of good moral character" who has met...