U.S. Department of Justice

Executive Office for Immigration Review

Office of the Director
5107 Leesburg Pike, Suite 2400
Falls Church, Virginia 22041

Contact: Office of Public Affairs

(703)305-0289, Fax: (703) 605-0365

Internet: www.usdoj.gov/eoir

IMMIGRATION JUDGE TAKES OATH OF OFFICE IN SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA

SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA -- Robert O. Vicars, Jr., will be sworn in today as an Immigration Judge during an investiture ceremony at 2:00 p.m., in the United States Courthouse, Courtroom G. Chief Immigration Judge Michael J. Creppy, from the Executive Office for Immigration Review in Falls Church, Virginia, will administer the oath of office.

Judge Vicars joins the ranks of more than 200 Immigration Judges located in 52 Immigration Courts throughout the Nation. They are responsible for conducting formal administrative proceedings to determine whether foreign-born individuals who are charged with violations of Federal immigration law should be removed from the United States or granted relief from removal. Immigration Judges decide each case independently and their decisions are final unless appealed or certified to the Board of Immigration Appeals. In the past year, Immigration Judges completed more than 265,000 such proceedings. They are also authorized to administer oaths of citizenship to candidates for naturalization.

Judge Vicars was appointed Immigration Judge in March 1999 and is currently serving in the Immigration Court at the Mira Loma Facility in Lancaster, California. He received his B.A. in 1972 from California State University at Hayward, and his J.D. in 1979 from Western State University College of Law. From 1989 to March 1999, Judge Vicars worked as an attorney with the Immigration and Naturalization Service serving as Deputy District Counsel, in Phoenix, Arizona; as Sector Counsel for the Border Patrol in San Ysidro and El Centro, California; and as Special Assistant U.S. Attorney in San Diego, California. He also worked as a Deputy District Attorney for the County of Imperial in ElCentro, California, from 1988 to 1989. Judge Vicars was in private practice from 1981 to 1988. He is a member of the California Bar.

-EOIR-