Lambda Legal Asks Federal Appeals Court to Grant Asylum to Gay Mexican Immigrant Who Suffered Severe Persecution from Police and Public

(Los Angeles, October 26, 2004) Lambda Legal today urged a federal appeals court to grant asylum to a man who faced severe antigay persecution in his native Mexico but was rejected for asylum by an immigration judge who said he didn't seem gay and could hide his sexual orientation to avoid persecution.

Lambda Legal represents Jorge Soto Vega, a 35-year-old man from Tuxpan, Mexico, who faced severe harassment and violence from the community and his family from an early age. He was detained and beaten severely by police who threatened to kill him if they saw him again because they wanted to get rid of gay people. Last year, a Southern California immigration judge ruled that there was credible evidence that Soto Vega was persecuted in Mexico because of his sexual orientation, but rejected his application for asylum in the U.S., saying Soto Vega didn't appear gay to him and could keep his sexual orientation hidden if he chose to.

Lambda Legal, which supported Soto Vega's unsuccessful effort to reverse that ruling at the Board of Immigration Appeals last year, is now representing Soto Vega in an appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in San Francisco. The 56-page brief Lambda Legal filed today asks the federal appeals court to reverse the immigration judge's ruling and order federal officials to process Soto Vega's asylum application.

"People are granted asylum in the U.S. because they face persecution in their home countries based on religion, political beliefs, sexual orientation, gender and other factors that are part of their basic identity. We grant people asylum in America because their countries have told them they have to change who they are in order to be safe," said Jon Davidson, Senior Counsel for Lambda Legal in its Western Regional Office and the lead attorney on the case. "The basic premise of asylum is in question when an immigration judge recognizes that a man is being persecuted and sends him back to the country telling him to disguise the very characteristic that leads to persecution and makes him eligible for asylum. The immigration judge's ruling is deeply disturbing and misguided, and we intend to secure asylum for Jorge Soto Vega."

In January 2003, an immigration judge in Los Angeles who heard testimony from Soto Vega and others ruled that he must return to Mexico. While saying Soto Vega's testimony was credible, the judge said that he did not meet the criteria for asylum because he could hide his sexual orientation and could live in parts of Mexico that were not as hostile to gay people. "[ I ]t seems to me that if he returned to Mexico in some other community, that it would not be obvious that he would be homosexual unless he made that ... obvious himself," the judge ruled.

Lambda Legal said the public and law enforcement officials in much of Mexico continue to harass and assault gay people. Soto Vega's basic rights would be violated if he was forced to behave differently in order to avoid appearing gay, Lambda Legal argues.

"Asylum doesn't hinge on whether people can hide their religion or political beliefs or race or sexual orientation -- it's decided on whether they face persecution based on those factors, and Jorge Soto Vega clearly does," Davidson said.

Lambda Legal, which argued the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case striking down sodomy laws last year, said that ruling makes it clear that Soto Vega has a right to maintain same-sex relationships without government interference -- a right that would be infringed on if he were forced not to be in a relationship with a man in order to avoid disclosing that he is gay. Lambda Legal also cites a number of previous cases of people who were granted asylum for a variety of reasons and weren't told to go back to their countries and hide their identities or beliefs in order to avoid persecution.

Soto Vega left his small hometown of Tuxpan for the more cosmopolitan city of Guadalajara in his late teens to attend junior college. But after an altercation with the police where he was beaten, robbed and threatened with his life, Soto Vega left Mexico for the U.S. He lived in Los Angeles for 15 years and ran a flower and interior design shop with his partner, who is an American citizen. But in 2001, Soto Vega returned to Mexico for his mother's funeral. Although his mother left him the family grocery store business, he feared for his safety and left Mexico. Soto Vega paid to be smuggled back into the U.S., spending hours in the trunk of a car, and filed for asylum within a year. He remains in the U.S. while his case is being appealed.

The U.S. Department of Justice, which defends immigration decisions, has 30 days to file a reply to today's filing in the federal appeals court.

Davidson and Jack Senterfit, Senior Staff Attorney in Lambda Legal's Southern Regional Office, are the attorneys in Soto Vega v. Ashcroft.

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Contact: Fred Shank, 212/809-8585 x267

Lambda Legal is a national organization committed to achieving full recognition of the civil rights of lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, transgender people and those with HIV. Jorge Soto Vega's case is the latest in Lambda Legal's decades of work on behalf of LGBT immigrants. In the 1970s, Lambda Legal fought successfully on behalf of people who were blocked from becoming American citizens because of their sexual orientation. In the 1980s, a Lambda Legal lawsuit resulted in a federal judge striking down an INS policy of barring visitors who said they are gay, and most recently Lambda Legal persuaded the INS not to bar lesbians and gay men from obtaining visas to adopt children overseas.