PATRICIA PETERS V. JANET NAPOLITANO, No. 10-55889 (9th Cir. 2014)
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FILED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT PATRICIA AUDREY PETERS, Plaintiff - Appellant, v. JANET A. NAPOLITANO, Secretary of the United States Department of Homeland Security, MAR 20 2014 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS No. 10-55889 D.C. No. 2:08-cv-05083-GHK-SS Central District of California, Los Angeles ORDER Defendant - Appellee. Before: TALLMAN, CLIFTON, and CALLAHAN, Circuit Judges. This case is submitted as of the file date of this order. FILED NOT FOR PUBLICATION UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS MAR 20 2014 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT PATRICIA AUDREY PETERS, Plaintiff - Appellant, No. 10-55889 D.C. No. 2:08-cv-05083-GHK-SS v. ORDER* JANET A. NAPOLITANO, Secretary of the United States Department of Homeland Security, Defendant - Appellee. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of California George H. King, Chief District Judge, Presiding Argued August 6, 2013 Submitted March 20, 2014 Pasadena, California Before: TALLMAN, CLIFTON, and CALLAHAN, Circuit Judges. Patricia Peters appeals the district court s judgment affirming, under the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) denial of Peters application for adjustment of status. Three * This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3. days after the district court entered judgment, USCIS issued a Notice to Appear commencing removal proceedings. Because the commencement of removal proceedings forecloses any plausible relief on Peters APA claim, we dismiss this appeal as moot. Under Cabaccang v. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, 627 F.3d 1313, 1315 17 (9th Cir. 2010), a district court loses subject-matter jurisdiction of an APA claim challenging USCIS s denial of an application for adjustment of status once removal proceedings have begun and the same relief may be pursued before the immigration court. Peters concedes that if we were to find error in the district court s resolution of the claim, the district court could not enter a judgment for Peters on remand. And even assuming we could remand directly to USCIS, such a remand would be futile at this point because now the immigration judge has exclusive jurisdiction over [Peters ] adjustment of status application[.] Ibarra v. Swacina, 628 F.3d 1269, 1270 (11th Cir. 2010). As for her challenge to the decision of USCIS, the commencement of removal proceedings has left Peters without a legally cognizable interest in the outcome, Powell v. McCormack, 395 U.S. 486, 496 97 (1969), and reduced her appeal of the agency s resolution to an abstract exercise. It has been long settled that a federal court has no authority to give opinions upon moot questions or abstract propositions, or to declare principles or rules of law which cannot affect the matter in issue in the case before it. Church of Scientology v. United States, 506 U.S. 9, 12 (1992) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). When an event occurs while a case is pending on appeal that makes it impossible for the court to grant any effectual relief[,] . . . the appeal must be dismissed. Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). The appeal is DISMISSED as moot.
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