回复: 北京起诉的情况,有人想加入没
[FONT=garamond, serif]参加起诉的同学应该都收到律师这个最新的更新吧。好像法院要做出判决的话,要到12年年底,还没仔细看,先贴上来。[/FONT]
[FONT=garamond, serif]As the New Year has dawned, I should give you an update on the mandamus litigation. The news is mixed (but not negative).[/FONT]
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[FONT=garamond, serif]Our litigation is delayed because opposing counsel, Stephen Gold, will be away on holiday for the last two weeks of January. I had asked the Court to arrange an organizational meeting in January because Mr. Gold had disagreed with my statement that we had agreed to have representative cases from each visa post for each of the two classes of litigants but averred that he was willing to discuss the issue. Hopefully we will meet in early February.[/FONT]
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[FONT=garamond, serif]Once the methodology has been settled, I would expect our written arguments to be due thirty days later; i.e., in March; which would mean that written arguments would not be completed until May, after which the Court would decide whether the cases may be argued and, if so, will give a hearing date ninety days after releasing that decision; i.e., no earlier than August but more likely September or October. Thus, unless CIC decides to settle somewhere along the line, the Court's decision is unlikely to be released until the end of the year.[/FONT]
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[FONT=garamond, serif]The good news, however, is that yesterday a senior Registry Officer in Ottawa mentioned that the staff had seen a website (but she could not remember which) giving statistics on FSW applications and they could not figure out how CIC will ever be able to get to the older cases if it continues to assess new cases first. While the fact that the staff recognizes the merits of our case does not mean that a judge will as well, it is good news that the Court's personnel have grasped the impact of CIC's queue-jumping processing policy and find it unfathomable and perplexing.[/FONT]
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[FONT=garamond, serif]A request for CIC's "inventory" as of December 31st and the targets per category per visa post has been made. Last year, CIC responded to such an access request on January 28th. So, hopefully I will have a copy before the next organizational meeting.[/FONT]
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[FONT=garamond, serif]At this point we have 562 litigants, 487 of whose files were lodged in Damascus (176) or New Delhi (311). (In addition, a lawyer in Montreal has filed 100 cases for applicants with files in Damascus.) Thus, inclusion of litigants with files being warehoused in other visa posts will broaden our base and enhance our arguments while additional Delhi and Damascus files will not. However, the numbers have certainly drawn the Court's attention and if the numbers continue to increase, CIC might decide that it would be better to settle than to be buried in litigants.[/FONT]
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[FONT=garamond, serif]I do not anticipate sending out another update until we have the next organizational meeting in February. Updates will, of course, be posted on the website, unfairCIC.com.[/FONT]
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[FONT=garamond, serif]Best wishes for the New Year,[/FONT]
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[FONT=garamond, serif]Tim [/FONT]