Denver appeals court weighs military impostor law
National News
A federal appeals court in Denver was hearing arguments Thursday on whether Congress can make it illegal to falsely claim to be a military hero.
At issue is the Stolen Valor Act, which makes it a crime punishable by up to a year in jail to falsely claim to have been awarded a military medal.
The case before the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals centers on Rick Strandlof, a Colorado man who was arrested after claiming he was wounded in Iraq as a Marine and had received military medals. His lawyers have acknowledged the claims were false.
A federal judge ruled the law violated the First Amendment. Prosecutors asked the 10th Circuit to uphold the law, which has also been challenged in California.
The law makes it a crime punishable by up to a year in jail to falsely claim to have received a medal from the U.S. military.
Some legal scholars have said they expect the law to eventually land before the U.S. Supreme Court.
In the Colorado case, Strandlof, who founded a veterans group in Colorado Springs, was charged in 2009 with violating the law by claiming to be an ex-Marine who was wounded in Iraq and received the Purple Heart and Silver Star. The military said it had no record that he ever served.
A federal judge threw out the case in July, ruling the U.S. government had not shown any compelling reason to restrict that particular type of speech.
The judge also ruled that lying about getting a military medal doesn't fall into any of the limited exceptions to free speech that the Supreme Court has recognized, including fraud.
The law doesn't require a showing that an alleged impostor got financial benefits or caused financial harm for a conviction.
In the California case, Xavier Alvarez, a water board official from Pomona, was indicted in 2007 after saying at a public forum that he was a retired Marine who received the Medal of Honor, the nation's highest military decoration.
He pleaded guilty on condition that he would be allowed to appeal on First Amendment grounds. A three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit ruled 2-1 in his favor in August.
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USCIS Will Begin Accepting CW-1 Petitions for Fiscal Year 2019
On April 2, 2018, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) will begin accepting petitions under the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI)-Only Transitional Worker (CW-1) program subject to the fiscal year (FY) 2019 cap. Employers in the CNMI use the CW-1 program to employ foreign workers who are ineligible for other nonimmigrant worker categories. The cap for CW-1 visas for FY 2019 is 4,999.
For the FY 2019 cap, USCIS encourages employers to file a petition for a CW-1 nonimmigrant worker up to six months in advance of the proposed start date of employment and as early as possible within that timeframe. USCIS will reject a petition if it is filed more than six months in advance. An extension petition may request a start date of Oct. 1, 2018, even if that worker’s current status will not expire by that date.
Since USCIS expects to receive more petitions than the number of CW-1 visas available for FY 2019, USCIS may conduct a lottery to randomly select petitions and associated beneficiaries so that the cap is not exceeded. The lottery would give employers the fairest opportunity to request workers, particularly with the possibility of mail delays from the CNMI.
USCIS will count the total number of beneficiaries in the petitions received after 10 business days to determine if a lottery is needed. If the cap is met after those initial 10 days, a lottery may still need to be conducted with only the petitions received on the last day before the cap was met. USCIS will announce when the cap is met and whether a lottery has been conducted.