Judge Suzette Smikle

FY 2019 - 2024, Atlanta Immigration Court

Published Nov 7, 2024

Suzette A. Smikle was appointed as an Immigration Judge to begin hearing cases in October 2022. Judge Smikle earned a Bachelor of Arts in 1997 from Georgetown University and a Juris Doctor in 2002 from Harvard Law School. From 2019 to 2022, she served as an assistant U.S. attorney (AUSA) at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida; and from 2010 to 2019, she served as an AUSA at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia. From February 2015 to September 2016, while on a temporary detail, Judge Smikle served as the Resident Legal Advisor for the United States Embassies in Bujumbura, Burundi (February-August 2015) and Niamey, Niger (August 2015 to September 2016) through the Office of Overseas Prosecutorial Development, Assistance and Training, Department of Justice. From 2008 to 2010, Judge Smikle served as a regional legal officer with the U.S. Agency for International Development, in Washington, D.C., and Lima, Peru; and from 2003 to 2008, she served as a trial attorney with the Consumer Protection Branch of DOJ in Washington, D.C. From 2002 to 2003, before beginning her service as a trial attorney, Judge Smikle was a judicial law clerk in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida. She is a member of the District of Columbia Bar, the Florida Bar, and the State Bar of Georgia.

Deciding Asylum Cases

Detailed data on decisions by Judge Smikle were examined for the period covering fiscal years 2019 through 2024. During this period, court records show that Judge Smikle decided 146 asylum claims on their merits. Of these, she granted asylum for 32, granted 3 other types of relief, and denied relief to 111. Converted to percentage terms, Smikle denied 76.0 percent and granted 24.0 percent of asylum cases (including forms of relief other than asylum).

Figure 1 provides a comparison of Judge Smikle'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 Smikle's denial rate of 76.0 percent, Immigration Court judges across the country denied 57.7 percent of asylum claims during this same period. Judges at the Atlanta Immigration Court where Judge Smikle decided these cases denied asylum 84 percent of the time. See Figure 2.

Judge Smikle'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 (77%) are denied asylum. In contrast, a significantly higher proportion of represented asylum seekers are successful. In the case of Judge Smikle, 32.9% were not represented by an attorney. See Figure 3. For the nation as a whole, about 16.4% 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 Smikle came from Venezuela. Individuals from this country made up 13.7% of her caseload. Other nationalities in descending order of frequency appearing before Judge Smikle were: Peru (12.3%), El Salvador (11.0%), Nicaragua (10.3%), Mexico (8.9%). 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 (14.0%), Guatemala (13.2%), Honduras (12.4%), Mexico (8.2%), China (6.1%), India (5.4%), Venezuela (4.0%), Ecuador (3.7%), Nicaragua (3.5%), Colombia (2.9%), Cuba (2.6%), Brazil (2.6%), Russia (2.4%).