Cases That Shape Immigration Law
Our attorneys have litigated the issues that decide whether immigrant families get to stay. We explain them honestly — the wins, the losses, and what each decision teaches.
Why this library exists and how to read it
A lot of law-firm "results" pages are wish-fulfillment. They list wins. They leave out losses. They convert every case into a marketing line.
This is not that page.
The cases below are real appellate and federal-court decisions our attorneys argued or briefed — at the U.S. Supreme Court, the Ninth Circuit, the Tenth Circuit, the Eighth Circuit, and the Board of Immigration Appeals. We have a few wins, a few mixed results, and a real number of losses. Some came back as mixed results — a piece granted, a piece denied, a remand for the agency to try again under the right standard. Every one of them helped decide how a piece of immigration law actually works for the next family that walks into an immigration court.
We publish them together for two reasons. First, because the people who hire us deserve to know the work we have actually done — the published record, not a sales line. Second, because immigration law is built case by case, and the losses are part of how it gets built. A petition denied at the Ninth Circuit is still a published opinion that other lawyers cite, and that judges read, and that — sometimes — the Supreme Court later vindicates or overturns. We do not hide them. We explain them.
A few of these cases predate Novo Legal Group. Our attorneys built this body of work at the firms they led before founding Novo — the Immigrant Advocacy & Litigation Center (Luis Cortes Romero, in Kent, Washington), Elinoff & Associates (Aaron Elinoff, in Denver), Global Justice Law Group and Rios & Cruz (Alma David, in Seattle). Each card below names the firm at the time of the litigation. The work is theirs; the framing here is honest about when and where it was done.
If you are evaluating Novo Legal Group for an appellate matter or a complex removal case — schedule an honest case review or call (888) 746-5245. We tell you what the case actually looks like, including what we cannot promise.
How to read these cards
Each card below carries the same fields, in the same order, so you can compare them.
- Case name and citation. The caption as the court filed it, with the docket number and (where verified) the official reporter cite.
- Court and year. What court decided it and when.
- Outcome. In plain language. "Petition granted" means the court ruled for our client. "Petition denied" means the court ruled against our client. "Mixed result" means a piece of it went each way. "Precedent decision" means the court issued a published opinion that other courts now cite — separate from whether our client won or lost.
- Attorney(s) of record. The lawyer who argued the case, briefed the case, or served as counsel of record. Firm at the time is named for every appearance — Novo Legal Group where it was Novo, and the predecessor firm where it was not.
- What this case shaped. One sentence on what the decision teaches about the law.
- Official opinion. A link to the court's published PDF on a `.gov` or `.uscourts.gov` site, so you can read the source yourself.
The cases
Quebrado Cantor v. Garland, 17 F.4th 869 (9th Cir. 2021)
No. 19-73085 (9th Cir. 2021) · Cite: 17 F.4th 869
Outcome: Petition granted; remanded to the Board of Immigration Appeals.
Counsel: Luis Cortes Romero (argued), Novo Legal Group PLLC, Kent, Washington; Elaine Ruth Fordyce, Law Office of Shara Svendsen PLLC, Mill Creek, Washington.
What this case shaped. The Ninth Circuit held that a defective Notice to Appear — and a later final order of removal — cannot retroactively trigger the "stop-time rule" that cuts off eligibility for cancellation of removal. The decision sits in the line running through Pereira v. Sessions and Niz-Chavez v. Garland, which addresses how the document-service triggers under 8 U.S.C. § 1229b(d)(1) actually work; it does not address the separate criminal-conviction trigger under the same provision. It is the firm's first verified published Ninth Circuit caption.
Read the opinion: Ninth Circuit official PDF (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
Garcia v. United States, No. 3:17-cv-05380-WHA (N.D. Cal. 2018)
No. 3:17-cv-05380-WHA (N.D. Cal., before Judge Alsup); plaintiffs became respondents in DHS v. Regents (No. 18-587 SCOTUS)
Outcome: Nationwide preliminary injunction issued (Jan. 9, 2018) requiring DHS to maintain DACA; APA and Fifth Amendment due-process claims sustained on the government's motion to dismiss. The plaintiffs ultimately prevailed at the Supreme Court in DHS v. Regents (2020).
Counsel: Luis Cortes Romero, counsel of record for the DACA-recipient plaintiffs (Dulce Garcia and five co-plaintiffs), Immigrant Advocacy & Litigation Center PLLC, Kent, Washington (predecessor practice — pre-Novo).
What this case shaped. Garcia is one of five consolidated Northern District of California cases that produced the first nationwide order requiring the federal government to keep accepting DACA renewals after the 2017 rescission. It is also the only one of the five where DACA recipients themselves were named plaintiffs — not states, not universities, but the people whose status was on the line. That through-line is what carried the litigation to the Supreme Court.
Read the opinion: N.D. Cal. PDF (Govinfo) (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
Department of Homeland Security v. Regents of the University of California, 140 S. Ct. 1891 (2020)
140 S. Ct. 1891 (2020); Nos. 18-587, 18-588, 18-589
Outcome: Precedent decision. The Supreme Court held 5–4 that the Department of Homeland Security's 2017 rescission of DACA was arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedure Act.
Counsel: Luis Cortes Romero, co-counsel on the merits brief for the DACA Recipient Respondents, Immigrant Advocacy & Litigation Center PLLC, Kent, Washington (predecessor practice — pre-Novo). Theodore B. Olson was counsel of record and argued the case; Luis sat second chair at counsel table.
What this case shaped. Regents is the modern foundation for arguing that an agency cannot wind down a major immigration program without explaining itself in real terms. Beyond DACA, it is the case lower courts now cite when DHS tries to undo a long-running program by press release.
Read the opinion: Supreme Court PDF (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
Nolasco-Amaya v. Garland, No. 20-70187 (9th Cir. 2021)
No. 20-70187 (9th Cir. 2021), for publication
Outcome: Mixed result — petition dismissed in part, granted in part; remanded.
Counsel: Luis Cortes Romero, sole counsel of record for the petitioner; submitted on the briefs (no oral argument). Immigrant Advocacy & Litigation Center PLLC, Kent, Washington (predecessor practice — filed roughly five weeks before our first verified Novo Legal Group caption).
What this case shaped. The Ninth Circuit held that the Board of Immigration Appeals had violated due process by summarily dismissing an appeal in withholding-only proceedings without explaining itself — and remanded for the BIA to take another look. At the same time, the panel held it had no jurisdiction to entertain a collateral attack on the underlying removal order. Nolasco-Amaya is what a real mixed result looks like: a procedural win on the due-process issue the BIA tried to short-cut, paired with a hard jurisdictional limit on what the federal courts can revisit at the petition-for-review stage.
Read the opinion: Ninth Circuit PDF (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
Flores-Castillo v. Barr, No. 19-9512 (10th Cir. 2019)
No. 19-9512 (10th Cir. Oct. 30, 2019), unpublished order and judgment, citable for persuasive value under 10th Cir. R. 32.1
Outcome: Petition granted; remanded to the immigration judge for further proceedings.
Counsel: Aaron Elinoff, counsel of record for petitioner (entered appearance April 1, 2019); Ricardo Vasquez, co-counsel for petitioner. Novo Legal Group, Denver, Colorado.
Co-counsel attribution and firm affiliation as reproduced on the FindLaw cover-sheet of the opinion; the official Tenth Circuit order and judgment does not contain a counsel block. PACER-sourced docket snapshot independently confirms Aaron Elinoff's April 1, 2019 entry of appearance for the petitioner.
What this case shaped. Flores-Castillo is a Tenth Circuit application of the principle that an immigration judge retains authority under 8 C.F.R. § 1003.23(b)(1) to reopen and reissue a prior decision in a case where jurisdiction has not vested with the Board — including, as here, where lead counsel conceded ineffective assistance after missing the 30-day deadline to file a petition for review. The Tenth Circuit additionally held that the agency cannot defend such a denial on alternative grounds the immigration judge never relied on. It is the earliest verified Novo Legal Group appellate appearance; the firm's first verified published appellate caption remains Quebrado Cantor v. Garland (9th Cir. 2021).
Read the opinion: Tenth Circuit order and judgment (Govinfo) (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
Robles-Garcia v. Barr, 944 F.3d 1280 (10th Cir. 2019)
944 F.3d 1280 (10th Cir. 2019); No. 18-9511, for publication
Outcome: Petition denied in part; dismissed in part. The Tenth Circuit upheld the agency's conclusion that the petitioner's prior conviction was a crime involving moral turpitude that barred cancellation of removal, and dismissed an unexhausted Pereira argument on jurisdictional grounds.
Counsel: Aaron Elinoff (argued for petitioner); Danielle C. Jefferis (with him on the supplemental brief). Elinoff & Associates, Denver, Colorado (predecessor practice — petition and opening brief filed before the 2018 merger that formed Novo Legal Group).
What this case shaped. The categorical-approach holding stands. But the jurisdictional half of the opinion has not aged the same way: in Santos-Zacaria v. Garland, 598 U.S. 411 (2023), the Supreme Court held that the INA's exhaustion requirement is not jurisdictional — the very framework the Tenth Circuit used to dismiss the Pereira argument here. Years later, in Santos-Zacaria, the Supreme Court reframed the procedural rule the panel used here — though our client's underlying ineligibility for cancellation, based on the categorical analysis of the conviction, was not disturbed. That, too, is part of how appellate practice works: an argument about how a court should reach an issue can outlast the case it was raised in.
Read the opinion: Tenth Circuit PDF (Govinfo) (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
Luna-Corona v. Bondi, 159 F.4th 1210 (10th Cir. 2025)
159 F.4th 1210 (10th Cir. 2025); No. 24-9522, for publication
Outcome: Petition denied. The Tenth Circuit upheld the agency's negative good-moral-character determination based on a recidivist 2017 DUI (a fourth conviction); cancellation of removal denied.
Counsel: Luis Cortes Romero and Amy Rubenstein, on the briefs for petitioner (submitted on the briefs — no oral argument). Novo Legal Group, LLC, Denver, Colorado.
What this case shaped. Luna-Corona is one of the Tenth Circuit's recent applications of the INA's good-moral-character framework to cancellation-of-removal petitioners with recidivist criminal histories. On the facts here — a fourth DUI conviction, recent in time — the agency's negative good-moral-character determination foreclosed cancellation relief. The case is a worked example of how the INA's good-moral-character analysis interacts with a recidivist record; it is not a general rule that every DUI history forecloses cancellation, and the analysis is fact-specific.
Read the opinion: Tenth Circuit PDF (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
G.C. v. Bondi (Edgar G.C. v. Bondi), No. 21-1228 (9th Cir. 2025)
No. 21-1228 (9th Cir.), amended opinion filed May 8, 2025, for publication
Outcome: Petition denied. The Ninth Circuit upheld the BIA's particularly-serious-crime determination on a California Penal Code § 245(a)(4) assault conviction, barring withholding of removal; rehearing and rehearing en banc denied. Judge Sanchez partially dissented.
Counsel: Luis Cortes Romero and Amy Rubenstein, on the briefs for petitioner (the Cornell Law School Asylum and CAT Appellate Clinic argued). Novo Legal Group PLLC, Kent, Washington.
What this case shaped. G.C. applies the Ninth Circuit's framework for what counts as a "particularly serious crime" under the Immigration and Nationality Act to a California Penal Code § 245(a)(4) assault conviction. Judge Sanchez's partial dissent identifies areas where the panel's analysis is contested — the kind of disagreement that, in a published opinion, can shape how the issue is presented in future cases.
Read the opinion: Ninth Circuit PDF (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
Matter of W-G-R-, 26 I&N Dec. 208 (BIA 2014)
26 I&N Dec. 208 (BIA 2014), Interim Decision #3794
Outcome: Precedent decision; appeal dismissed (adverse to respondent).
Counsel: Alma L. David, for respondent. The BIA decision lists Alma as "Esquire, Seattle, Washington" without naming a firm.
What this case shaped. Matter of W-G-R- is the BIA's modern framework for analyzing "particular social group" — the two-step test of social distinction and particularity that every former-gang-membership claim, and many other PSG claims, now has to navigate. The outcome was adverse to the respondent, and we name that plainly. But the precedent itself is one of the half-dozen BIA decisions every asylum lawyer in the country has to read.
Read the opinion: DOJ EOIR PDF (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
Garay Reyes v. Lynch, 842 F.3d 1125 (9th Cir. 2016)
No. 14-70686 (9th Cir. 2016), for publication; reporter cite 842 F.3d 1125
Outcome: Mixed result — petition granted in part and denied in part; denial of relief under the Convention Against Torture vacated and remanded.
Counsel: Alma David, counsel for petitioner (co-counsel with a University of Minnesota Law School clinic). Global Justice Law Group, PLLC, Seattle, Washington (predecessor practice — pre-Novo).
What this case shaped. Garay Reyes is the partial vindication of the same client whose BIA case became Matter of W-G-R-. The Ninth Circuit upheld the agency's PSG analysis under Chevron deference but vacated the CAT denial, holding that the BIA had applied the wrong standard of review to the IJ's predictive findings, and remanded to the agency for reconsideration under the correct standard. The two decisions together — the BIA's W-G-R- and the Ninth Circuit's Garay Reyes — show how a single asylum case can produce both adverse precedent on one ground and a real remand on another.
Read the opinion: Ninth Circuit PDF (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
Diego v. Sessions, 857 F.3d 1005 (9th Cir. 2017)
857 F.3d 1005 (9th Cir. 2017); No. 13-72048, for publication
Outcome: Petition dismissed in part and denied in part. Precedent decision.
Counsel: Alma David (argued for petitioner). Global Justice Law Group PLLC, Seattle, Washington (predecessor practice — pre-Novo).
What this case shaped. The Ninth Circuit held that an Oregon attempted-sexual-abuse conviction was an aggravated felony warranting termination of asylee status, and held that the court had no jurisdiction to review the discretionary denial of adjustment and waivers. Subsequent Ninth Circuit cases have applied Diego's categorical analysis to different state-law records — for example, Mero v. Barr (9th Cir. 2020) distinguished Diego on its facts. The categorical-approach analysis at the center of Diego, running through Mathis and Descamps, is the framework federal courts use to match state criminal convictions against federal generic-offense definitions for immigration purposes.
Read the opinion: Ninth Circuit PDF (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
Andrade v. Lynch, 798 F.3d 1242 (9th Cir. 2015)
798 F.3d 1242 (9th Cir. 2015); No. 12-70803, for publication, per curiam
Outcome: Petition denied. Precedent decision.
Counsel: Alma David, counsel for petitioner (submitted without oral argument). Rios & Cruz, P.S., Seattle, Washington (predecessor practice — pre-Novo).
What this case shaped. The Ninth Circuit held that the record before the agency did not compel the conclusion that the petitioner's tattoos, on their own, established a likelihood of torture in El Salvador for purposes of CAT deferral. Andrade sits alongside other Ninth Circuit deferral-of-removal cases that test how much the evidence has to do at the petition-for-review stage.
Read the opinion: Ninth Circuit PDF (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
Uzodinma v. Barr, 951 F.3d 960 (8th Cir. 2020)
951 F.3d 960 (8th Cir. 2020); Docket 18-3437, for publication
Outcome: Petition denied. Precedent decision.
Counsel: Luis Cortes Romero and Alma David, on the brief for petitioner; the University of Minnesota Federal Immigration Litigation Clinic argued.
Counsel attribution and firm affiliation sourced from the FindLaw cover-sheet reproduction; the 8th Circuit's slip-opinion text we extracted does not include the counsel block. PACER docket or firm-archive confirmation of the brief signature block is the upgrade path.
What this case shaped. The Eighth Circuit held that the BIA's standard-of-review error — substituting findings without expressly finding clear error — was harmless because a separate particularized-threat finding sustained the denial of relief. The court also upheld the BIA's corroboration requirement. The case is the firm's first verified appellate footprint outside the Supreme Court / Ninth Circuit / Tenth Circuit / BIA universe.
Read the opinion: Eighth Circuit PDF (opens in new tab)
Read the full case → Coming soon
Categories we handle on appeal
The cases above sit inside a broader appellate footprint. The categories we work in:
Published Ninth Circuit and Tenth Circuit petitions for review.
Most of the published decisions on this page are petitions for review of removal orders — the standard path a non-citizen takes from immigration court, through the Board of Immigration Appeals, to a federal circuit court. The Ninth Circuit (covering Washington, Oregon, California, Arizona, Nevada, and several other Western states) and the Tenth Circuit (covering Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Kansas) are the two circuits where our work appears most often.
Board of Immigration Appeals precedent.
When the BIA issues a published precedent decision — like Matter of W-G-R- — every immigration judge in the country has to follow it on the same legal question. Precedent BIA work is rarer than petition-for-review work; it is also some of the most consequential, because a single decision can change how thousands of asylum cases get analyzed.
Federal district-court litigation and Supreme Court work.
Garcia v. United States is a district-court preliminary-injunction case that became part of the consolidated DHS v. Regents posture at the Supreme Court. The federal courts hear immigration matters in two main shapes — petitions for review of removal orders (which start at the circuit court) and challenges to government action under the Administrative Procedure Act or the Constitution (which usually start at the district court). We work in both.
Civil rights and immigration overlap.
Some of our firm's most important matters sit at the seam between immigration law and civil rights — conditions of confinement, government misconduct, wrongful detention, the constitutional limits on what officers and agencies can do to non-citizens. Several of those matters are still in active litigation or in pre-publication review. We are not naming them on this page yet. As each one becomes a published decision and the client and counsel cleared for public discussion, it joins the library. The architectural space is reserved here on purpose.
Trial-level and agency-level matters we cannot list publicly yet.
A meaningful share of our practice is trial-level removal defense and agency matters at USCIS — cases that do not produce a published opinion at all, and that often cannot be discussed publicly because of attorney-client confidentiality and protective-order constraints. Those cases are not on this page. They are still the larger share of the work.
More cases will be added
This is the inaugural set. Additional decisions are added as verification clears.
In the queue: a series of additional Tenth Circuit cancellation-of-removal cases handled by Aaron Elinoff before the 2018 merger that formed Novo Legal Group — unpublished orders and judgments that are citable for persuasive value under Tenth Circuit Rule 32.1 and that are awaiting PACER docket confirmation of the firm-at-time attribution. A series of Ninth Circuit asylum and CAT cases handled by Luis Cortes Romero and Alma David at earlier firms is also in the verification queue. A Supreme Court companion case — Santiago v. Noem (W.D. Tex.) — is on hold pending an ethics screen for sealed material. We do not publish until verification is complete.
Why this matters for your case
We do not promise outcomes. We cannot — no honest lawyer can. What appellate experience gives a client is a different posture inside a current case: a lawyer who has stood in front of a federal circuit panel and made the argument, who has read the Board's precedent decisions the night before they came down, who can tell you in real terms what the standard of review on your particular issue is and whether the record you have can carry it.
That is the value the cases above represent. Not a win count. Not a guarantee. The fact that the firm has done the work, in front of the courts that decide these issues, often enough that you can read the opinions yourself before you decide to hire us.
If you are evaluating us, the right next step is an honest case review — not a sales call, not a quote-on-the-phone. A real conversation about what your case looks like, what the realistic range of outcomes is, and whether we are the right firm for it.
Schedule an honest case review
The attorneys behind these cases
The work above is the work of a team. Read the bios:
- Aaron Elinoff — Founding attorney; counsel of record on Flores-Castillo v. Barr (Tenth Circuit, Oct. 2019) — the firm's earliest verified Tenth Circuit appearance; argued Robles-Garcia v. Barr in the Tenth Circuit; pre-Novo Tenth Circuit cancellation work at Elinoff & Associates is in verification for inclusion in the library.
- Bryce Downer — Aaron's partner; merged Downer Legal Group into the firm in 2018 to form Novo Legal Group.
- Luis Cortes Romero — Partner; argued Quebrado Cantor v. Garland at the Ninth Circuit; co-counsel on the merits brief in DHS v. Regents at the Supreme Court; counsel of record on Garcia v. United States at the Northern District of California.
- Amy Rubenstein — Associate Attorney; on the briefs in Luna-Corona v. Bondi (Tenth Circuit) and G.C. v. Bondi (Ninth Circuit).
- Alma David — Of counsel; counsel of record on Matter of W-G-R- at the BIA; argued Diego v. Sessions at the Ninth Circuit; counsel on Garay Reyes v. Lynch and Andrade v. Lynch at earlier firms.
Related reading
- Appellate Advocacy in U.S. Immigration Cases — what an immigration appeal is, how the federal courts review removal orders, and where the BIA fits.
- Deportation Defense — how appellate work fits into a full removal-defense strategy.
- DACA Application Lawyers — the practice area Garcia v. United States and DHS v. Regents helped preserve.
- Civil Rights Lawyers in Colorado — how civil rights and immigration overlap in our litigation.
- Immigration Law overview — the broader practice the appellate work sits inside.