Thousands of Applications and Other Documents Shredded At INS California Service Center

IMMIGRATION LAW & POLICY

Obtaining Lawful Permanent Residence Status

THOUSANDS OF APPLICATIONS AND OTHER DOCUMENTS SHREDDED AT INS CALIFORNIA SERVICE CENTER
Immigrants' Rights Update, Vol. 17, No. 1, February 21, 2003

A federal grand jury has indicted two workers at the Immigration and Naturalization Service's California Service Center on charges that the two workers destroyed tens of thousands of documents. According to press reports, as many as 90,000 documents may have been destroyed, including applications for asylum, naturalization, adjustment of status, and employment authorization, as well as visa petitions, passports, and birth and marriage certificates. One of the workers, a file room manager, is alleged to have ordered contract workers to shred the documents in order to eliminate a backlog of unprocessed documents. The other indicted worker is a contract supervisor who participated in the shredding.

In a Jan. 30, 2003, statement, the INS stated that the indictments resulted from the agency's Apr. 2002 discovery of the shredding. According to the statement, the INS responded to the shredding by urging individuals who filed applications and petitions at the service center but did not receive a receipt for the filing to call a hotline (949-831-8427) to inquire about the status of their cases. Individuals who did receive receipts could also use the hotline to check on the status of their cases. According to the statement, the service center has also assisted applicants in reconstructing cases where the file could not be found. The agency has also remailed to applicants all requests for additional information that were sent out during the period that the shredding took place.