Judge, code DRK

Not hearing cases: nothing for over two years

Last hearing: September 8, 1988
Next hearing: none scheduled
Last decision: September 8, 1988

Courts worked at: 2

Worked here before

CHICAGO — IMMIGRATION COURT1953—1988 · 4,235 hearings
DETROIT — IMMIGRATION COURT1974—1988 · 993 hearings

The periods overlap, and that is not an error: a judge hears cases at a new court while still closing out old ones at the previous one. Each row answers "when did this judge work here", not "from when to when did they serve here".

Status is derived from the court calendar: whether the judge has hearings scheduled after the release cutoff. The EOIR release carries no personnel data, so retirement, removal, elevation to the BIA and extended absence cannot be told apart — only what the data shows is stated here. Hearings are scheduled two to three years out, so an empty calendar for a working judge is rare; for judges who went quiet in the last few months it may still be an artifact of the cutoff, which lags by about a month. The lookup table's "active" flag is not used: it disagrees with the calendar for a third of judges.

38%

Asylum grant rate

of 258 decisions · FY1969–FY1988

95% interval: 32% — 44%

granted:: 98
denied:: 160

The period has closed

This judge no longer hears cases, so the figure describes FY1969–FY1988 — not what happens in the court today. Asylum rules and the mix of cases have changed since.

How this percentage is calculated

Grant rate = granted / (granted + denied). Administrative closures, withdrawals, abandonment and "not adjudicated" are excluded from the denominator. The unit of count is a decision per proceeding, not per application: applicants almost always file asylum, withholding and CAT protection together. Withholding and CAT grants are counted separately from asylum. U.S. fiscal year: October 1 – September 30.

How this compares

This judge38% (258)
The whole court — CHICAGO — IMMIGRATION COURT42% (35,363)
All U.S. courts33% (1,350,724)

This comparison does not adjust for which cases a judge was given: judges see different nationalities, different shares of detained respondents, and different rates of legal representation. A difference in percentages does not by itself mean identical cases were treated differently.

Trend by fiscal year

U.S. fiscal year: October 1 – September 30.

Years with fewer than 10 decisions are not plotted (3): at that sample size the percentage is noise. They remain in the table.

Show as a table

Grant rate by fiscal year
Period	decisions	granted	95% interval
FY1988	87	52%	41% — 62%
FY1987	120	37%	29% — 46%
FY1986	48	17%	9% — 30%
FY1985	1	0%	0% — 79%
FY1984	1	100%	21% — 100%
FY1983	1	0%	0% — 79%

By applicant nationality

Grant rate by nationality, largest volumes first
Nationality	decisions	granted	95% interval
POLAND	65	51%	39% — 63%
IRAN	36	44%	30% — 60%
Former Countries	22	23%	10% — 43%
EL SALVADOR	16	19%	7% — 43%
LEBANON	14	36%	16% — 61%
PAKISTAN	13	0%	0% — 23%
NICARAGUA	12	25%	9% — 53%
CUBA	11	36%	15% — 65%
ETHIOPIA	10	80%	49% — 94%
PORTUGAL	8	13%	2% — 47%
GUATEMALA	5	20%	4% — 62%
GHANA	5	60%	23% — 88%
PHILIPPINES	4	0%	0% — 49%
IRAQ	4	50%	15% — 85%
BANGLADESH	3	0%	0% — 56%

How long a case takes

How long it took from service of the NTA to the decision on the application, for the cases this judge has already finished.

9 mo

median

half of cases: 5—21 mo

based on 258 cases

NTA-to-decision duration by fiscal year
Decided in	Cases	median	half of cases, mo
FY1988	87	8 mo	5—17
FY1987	120	11 mo	7—22
FY1986	48	8 mo	5—15

Duration runs from the NTA date (charging document served) to the decision on the application. Median, not mean: the distribution has a long right tail. Cases decided this year may have begun a decade ago, so duration by year of decision is not a forecast for a case filed today.

The queue

Cases with no decision yet. A different figure from the duration of completed cases: quick cases leave the queue first, so the long ones accumulate among those still waiting.

No undecided cases in this release.

What became of appeals to the BIA

An immigration judge's decision can be appealed to the Board of Immigration Appeals. This is what the Board did with those appeals. A high share of reversals and remands tells a different story than a low grant rate alone.

What became of appeals to the BIA
BIA decision	Appeals
Continued	182
Withdrawal of Appeal	104
Dismiss Appeal/Affirm IJ's Decision	88
Dismissed (Grant V/D 30 days)	84
Remand	36
Granted	25
Other	23
Denied	20
Sustain	15
Temporary Protected Status	11
American Baptist Church Settlement	3
RET	2
Grant with no Remand	1
Lacks Jurisdiction - BIA	1
Deferred Enforced Departure	1
Granted Soriano	1
Termination	1

Data comes from the monthly EOIR Case Data release (U.S. DOJ FOIA Library). This service is not affiliated with the U.S. government and does not provide legal advice. The data lags by roughly a month; for current case status use ACIS and Respondent Access. The source is known to have missing records, including relief applications — absent data does not mean it is absent from your case.