Ex-naturalized citizen ordered deported
ALFONSO CHARDY
MiamiHerald.com
Sep 13, 2006
Lionel Jean-Baptiste, the first naturalized American in recent times to lose his citizenship after a criminal conviction, gave up his legal battle Tuesday to stay in the United States and show he was wrongly stripped of his status.
U.S. immigration Judge Kenneth S. Hurewitz ordered Jean Baptiste, 58, deported to his native Haiti -- but advised him that he may yet get to stay in the United States if the Haitian government refuses to take him back.
''This court finds you deportable, and I order you removed to Haiti,'' Judge Hurewitz told Jean-Baptiste, clad in an orange detainee jumpsuit. ``But it may be that Haiti won't accept you back, and you may stay in the United States.''
Ralph Latortue, the Haitian consul general in Miami, told The Miami Herald in July that he will not issue a travel document to Jean-Baptiste if and when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement requests to remove the former U.S. citizen to Haiti.
The reason, said Latortue, is the 19-year-old Haitian Constitution, which regards Haiti-born people who become citizens of another country as no longer Haitian citizens. Therefore, Haiti would be under no obligation to accept Jean-Baptiste.
André Pierre, Jean-Baptiste's attorney, tried to convince Hurewitz that his client could not be deported both because at the time of conviction he was a U.S. citizen and because the Haitian government would not accept him.
