Kanwal Daler Singh v. ERIC H. HOLDER Jr., Attorney General

This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent*
except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.
The Honorable Matthew F. Kennelly, United States District Judge for**
the Northern District of Illinois, sitting by designation.
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
KANWAL DALER SINGH,
Petitioner,
v.
ERIC H. HOLDER Jr., Attorney
General,
Respondent.
No. 07-70064
Agency No. A078-674-509
MEMORANDUM*
On Petition for Review of an Order of the
Board of Immigration Appeals
Argued and Submitted November 4, 2010
San Francisco, California
Before: KOZINSKI, Chief Judge, RYMER, Circuit Judge and KENNELLY,
District Judge.**
The government failed to provide Singh the originals of the allegedly
fraudulent English letter from Dr. Bedi and the letter in Punjabi Dr. Bedi gave to
DHS investigators even though it knew Singh wanted to use the letters in his defense
FILED
DEC 07 2010
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U .S. C OU R T OF APPE ALS

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against the government’s allegations. See Dent v. Holder, No. 09-71987, 2010 WL
4455877, at *6 (9th Cir. Nov. 9, 2010) (holding that failure to provide documents in
government’s possession denied alien “an opportunity to fully and fairly litigate his
removal”). At Singh’s final hearing, the IJ stated that it would be “probative” of
Singh’s truthfulness if he could prove by forensic analysis of the originals that Dr.
Bedi signed letters in both English and Punjabi, yet refused to grant a continuance
for that purpose. This denied Singh a “reasonable opportunity to examine the
evidence against [him].” 8 U.S.C. § 1229a(b)(4)(B); see Ahmed v. Holder, 569 F.3d
1009, 1012–13 (9th Cir. 2009) (noting that denial of continuance shouldn’t exclude
evidence “of vital importance” to the alien’s case). This was an abuse of discretion.
Cruz Rendon v. Holder, 603 F.3d 1104, 1110–11 (9th Cir. 2010).
The adverse credibility determination and frivolous application finding are
vacated. The BIA’s denial of all relief to Singh resulted from these findings and is
likewise vacated. Because Maharaj v. Gonzales, 450 F.3d 961 (9th Cir. 2006) (en
banc), changed the law on firm resettlement findings, we leave that issue for the BIA
to address in the first instance. See INS v. Orlando Ventura, 537 U.S. 12, 17 (2002).
GRANTED.

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