Judge Vivienne E. Gordon-Uruakpa

FY 2018 - 2023, New York Immigration Court

Published Oct 19, 2023

Judge Gordon-Uruakpa was appointed as an Immigration Judge in June 2002. She received an undergraduate degree from Fordham University in 1980 and a Juris Doctorate from Howard School of Law in 1984. Judge Gordon-Uruakpa served as an assistant district counsel with the former Immigration and Naturalization Service in New York from 1996 to June 2002. From 1987 to 1996, she served as a staff attorney and supervisor with the Legal Aid Society, criminal defense division, also in New York. Judge Gordon-Uruakpa worked as a staff attorney/Reginald Heber Smith Fellow with the Legal Services Corporation, Chemung County Neighborhood Legal Services in Elmira, New York, from 1984 to 1986. She is a member of the New York Bar.

Deciding Asylum Cases

Detailed data on decisions by Judge Gordon-Uruakpa were examined for the period covering fiscal years 2018 through 2023. During this period, court records show that Judge Gordon-Uruakpa decided 943 asylum claims on their merits. Of these, she granted asylum for 811, granted 27 other types of relief, and denied relief to 105. Converted to percentage terms, Gordon-Uruakpa denied 11.1 percent and granted 88.9 percent of asylum cases (including forms of relief other than asylum).

Figure 1 provides a comparison of Judge Gordon-Uruakpa's denial rate each fiscal year over this recent period. (Rates for years with less than 25 decisions are not shown.)

Nationwide Comparisons

Compared to Judge Gordon-Uruakpa's denial rate of 11.1 percent, Immigration Court judges across the country denied 60.6 percent of asylum claims during this same period. Judges at the New York Immigration Court where Judge Gordon-Uruakpa decided these cases denied asylum 34.4 percent of the time. See Figure 2.

Judge Gordon-Uruakpa's asylum grant and denial rates are compared with other judges serving on the same court in this table. Note that when an Immigration Judge serves on more than one court during the same period, separate Immigration Judge reports are created for any Court in which the judge rendered at least 100 asylum decisions.

Why Do Denial Rates Vary Among Judges?

Although denial rates are shaped by each Judge's judicial philosophy, denial rates are also shaped by other factors, such as the types of cases on the Judge's docket, the detained status of immigrant respondents, current immigration policies, and other factors beyond an individual Judge's control. For example, TRAC has previously found that legal representation and the nationality of the asylum seeker are just two factors that appear to impact asylum decision outcomes.

The composition of cases may differ significantly between Immigration Courts in the country. Within a single Court when cases are randomly assigned to judges sitting on that Court, each Judge should have roughly a similar composition of cases given a sufficient number of asylum cases. Then variations in asylum decisions among Judges on the same Immigration Court would appear to reflect, at least in part, the judicial philosophy that the Judge brings to the bench. However, if judges within a Court are assigned to specialized dockets or hearing locations, then case compositions are likely to continue to differ and can contribute to differences in asylum denial rates.

Representation

When asylum seekers are not represented by an attorney, almost all of them (80%) are denied asylum. In contrast, a significantly higher proportion of represented asylum seekers are successful. In the case of Judge Gordon-Uruakpa, 2.8% were not represented by an attorney. See Figure 3. For the nation as a whole, about 15.7% of asylum seekers are not represented.

Nationality

Asylum seekers are a diverse group. Over one hundred different nationalities had at least one hundred individuals claiming asylum decided during this period. As might be expected, immigration courts located in different parts of the country tend to have proportionately larger shares from some countries than from others. And, given the required legal grounds for a successful asylum claim, asylum seekers from some nations tend to be more successful than others.

The largest group of asylum seekers appearing before Judge Gordon-Uruakpa came from China. Individuals from this country made up 45.1% of her caseload. Other nationalities in descending order of frequency appearing before Judge Gordon-Uruakpa were: India (10.2%), El Salvador (6.5%), Nepal (6.2%), Bangladesh (5.4%). See Figure 4.

In the nation as a whole during this same period, major nationalities of asylum seekers, in descending order of frequency, were El Salvador (16.6%), Guatemala (15.1%), Honduras (13.8%), Mexico (9.2%), China (6.8%), India (5.1%), Venezuela (3.2%), Ecuador (3.1%), Cuba (2.4%), Nicaragua (2.3%), Brazil (2.0%), Colombia (1.4%), Cameroon (1.4%).