U.S. Supreme Court
Supreme Court Accepts African Prison Guard’s Asylum Appeal
Posted Mar 17, 2008, 12:11 pm CDT
By Debra Cassens Weiss
A former prison camp guard who says he was forced to persecute others in Africa will get a chance to press his case for asylum with the U.S. Supreme Court.
Daniel Girmai Negusie was denied asylum because he helped operate a prison camp in Eritrea during a war with Ethiopia, SCOTUSblog reports. Federal law bars asylum for those who participate or assist in the persecution of others. But Negusie claims in his cert petition (PDF posted by SCOTUSblog) that the law doesn’t apply to him because he was forced persecute others under threats of torture or death.
Negusie served two years as a guard until he was able to escape by hiding in a shipping container.
The New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled that coercion is irrelevant. Its decision conflicts with the law in at least one other circuit, the cert petition says.
“In a world where the number of civil wars is increasing, and both sides often coerce individuals into military service, this issue is arising with increasing frequency—as demonstrated by the significant number of judicial decisions addressing it,” the petition says. “Capricious variation in the application of this nation’s asylum laws with respect to a frequently recurring issue cannot be tolerated.”
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Posted by hmmm - 5 months, 2 weeks, 4 days, 21 hours, 28 minutes ago
He was not a prison guard but rather a prisoner. Also he did not “operate” a prison but was tortured in the prison, which is why the judge granted him relief under the convention against torture.
Posted by clarification - 5 months, 1 week, 4 days, 5 hours, 27 minutes ago
One further point. The cert petition doesn’t actually argue that the law doesn’t apply to Negusie, but rather that the court should consider the fact that he was coerced to work as a guard. As it stands now in the 5th Circuit, that fact is “irrelevant.”