A Register of Immigrants' Fears

Mohammed's relatives filed somberly into his sister-in-law's cramped living room, too distracted to pass around the Moroccan sweets they usually enjoy after family dinners.

They had come to help the 38-year-old limousine driver make a grim choice: obey a government order requiring men from countries deemed terrorist havens to register with immigration authorities — and risk being swiftly deported for overstaying his tourist visa three years ago — or defy that command and potentially doom his pending effort to secure a green card.

Over the next five hours, family members took turns debating the options as Mohammed's wife wiped away tears. Finally, about 2 a.m., with the sun just hours from rising on the deadline day for Moroccans, Mohammed announced his conclusion: "I'm not going to register."

Immigration lawyers estimate that hundreds of immigrants across the nation have reached the same decision, consigning themselves and their families to an uncertain fate and substantially undermining a national security program whose aim is to account for tens of thousands of visitors in the United States from 25 nations, including much of the Middle East and South Asia.

"We're hearing from dozens and dozens of members who say they have clients they could not persuade to go in," said Crystal Williams of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. "That makes us think the numbers [of no-shows] could be quite significant."

Concerned by that possibility, the Immigration and Naturalization Service on Thursday announced that nationals of 18 countries — including Morocco — who had missed earlier deadlines would get a second chance to be photographed, fingerprinted and questioned between Jan. 27 and Feb. 7.

Immigration lawyers predict that the deadline extension will have only limited impact on those who so far have stayed away, as well as on immigrants from seven countries for whom the deadline has not yet passed.

Many entered the country illegally or overstayed their visas but then applied for permanent residency under a 2001 amnesty law. Because their applications have been delayed by massive INS and Department of Labor backlogs, such immigrants are now in legal limbo — on the verge of obtaining green cards, yet still subject to deportation until that day arrives.

Indeed, nearly 1,200 of those in this group who have shown up to register have been given notices to appear before a judge for a deportation hearing.

Fearful of suffering the same consequence — and alarmed by news reports that many of those detained were shackled and jailed for a night or longer — immigrants with pending residency applications are increasingly choosing to stay home, lawyers said.

Mohammed said he had even more cause for fear because he is one of hundreds of immigrants who were swindled in an infamous fraud scheme run by lawyer Samuel G. Kooritzky.

Working out of offices in Arlington, Takoma Park and Washington, Kooritzky filed hundreds of fake residency applications under the 2001 amnesty law on behalf of his unwitting clients — who often paid thousands of dollars for the service.

Authorities did not announce their discovery of the scam until July, after the deadline for filing a residency application under the amnesty.

Like other fraud victims, Mohammed hopes the INS will agree to waive the deadline and allow him to reapply. But the three lawyers he has consulted since Kooritzky was arrested have told him that could take months of negotiations — and possibly years of expensive litigation.

Until the matter is settled, Mohammed is leery of going before a judge for a deportation hearing.

Across the country, lawyers are hearing of similar jitters.

Sohail Mohammed, a Clifton, N.J., lawyer, arranged to meet a Moroccan client at the INS office in Newark at 10:30 a.m. the day of the original deadline, only to receive an urgent page at 10:15.

"It was my secretary, telling me that the man had called to say he was just too scared," Mohammed recalled.

Cynthia Rosenberg, a lawyer in Pikesville, Md., has three clients who refused to register. Stanton Braverman, in Arlington, has five.

"They have a serious interest in cooperating," Braverman said. "I think the INS would get close to 98 percent compliance [with the registration program] if it promised not to automatically put people with pending applications in deportation proceedings."

Justice Department spokesman Jorge Martinez said the INS does not have that authority. "It's up to the judge to decide the fate of each person on a case-by-case basis," he said.

Martinez speculated that an immigrant's willingness to register may earn favor with a judge. By contrast, he added, an immigrant's failure to register could be grounds for denying his pending green card application and ultimately deporting him.

Still, without guarantees as to how judges will rule — and whether Congress would some day change the laws altogether — many lawyers said they have a hard time advising their clients as to the wisest course.

"It's like a chess game," said Hamel Zyas, a lawyer in Cherry Hill, N.J.

Mohammed, for his part, has begun to reconsider his decision not to register, now that the government is offering a second chance.

"I can't think of anything else. I can't sleep at night," he said. "I'm living in constant fear of making the wrong choice."

At stake is the modest but hard-won progress he has made since arriving in Falls Church virtually penniless 3 1/2 years ago.

Born to a self-made business tycoon, Mohammed said he was raised amid steadily increasing prosperity as his father's empire grew to encompass eight multimillion-dollar companies.

At 26, Mohammed was running one of those companies and living with his parents and wife in a 14-bedroom mansion in Casablanca, he and relatives said.

"Its outer walls were pale green — like pistachios," Mohammed recalled, smiling at the memory. "The ceilings were hand-carved in the Moroccan style."

Then disaster struck in the form of an embezzling partner. The ensuing legal battles — and, Mohammed said, corrupt government officials — bankrupted the family.

In 1999, he moved his wife and two sons — the younger born in the United States during an earlier trip — into a relative's house in Falls Church and began working 14-hour days as a pizza delivery man, courier and gas station cashier.

The pizza job was the worst, he said: "At the end of the shift, you'd have to scrub all the pans in the kitchen."

But within six months, the couple had saved enough to begin renting a one-bedroom apartment. Five months later, they made their first major purchase: a $3,000 wide-screen Sony television.

"We didn't even have a bed yet. We were still sleeping on the carpet," said Mohammed's wife, who spoke on condition that not even her first name be used. "But Mohammed insisted. He said, 'After so many years, I want us to have something nice.' "

Other acquisitions followed as they began to turn the apartment into a miniature version of the pistachio-green mansion — with oil paintings on the walls, an ornately carved wood table in the dining area and a display cabinet of finely cut crystal vases in the small living room.

A year ago, Mohammed purchased a Lincoln Town Car and started a one-man limousine business that he said now earns him about $50,000 a year. He began making plans to buy a second and possibly a third car this spring.

Now he wonders whether he shouldn't sell the one he has and return to Morocco on his own terms. But when confronted with that possibility, his wife buried her face in her hands.

There is nothing left for them in Morocco, she said. Nearly all their extended family lives in the United States now. And what would happen to their two sons?

The 3 1/2-year-old looks the picture of the American citizen that he is. "SpongeBob SquarePants. Ed, Edd N Eddy," he prattles, listing his favorite cartoon shows in unaccented English.

But it is the 12-year-old she is most worried about: "He's forgotten all his classical Arabic. They'd stick him in second grade."

And the boy could have trouble fitting in. Although he lacks a U.S. passport, he, too, has been living an American life — debating the merits of the latest "Lord of the Rings" movie and playing classic board games after school with a Bolivian-born neighbor.

Their current favorite is the global strategy game Risk.

Is he good at it?

The boy shook his head, his smile fading.

"No," he said. "Not really."