The federal appeals court based in Denver rejected a man’s argument last month that he should be shielded from deportation because his felony menacing conviction in Colorado was not a “crime involving moral turpitude.”

Jorge Arturo Telles-Carranza is a Mexican citizen who entered the United States in 2006. The federal government began deportation proceedings in 2012. Soon afterward, he was convicted of felony menacing, which involving placing another person in fear of serious injury through the use of a deadly weapon.

Although the government may exercise its discretion to cancel a person’s deportation, that discretion does not generally extend to crimes involving moral turpitude. There is no definition of that phrase in federal law, but federal courts and the government have interpreted it to mean “depraved” conduct involving “evil intent.”

After challenging an immigration judge’s finding that his felony menacing conviction was a crime involving moral turpitude, Telles-Carranza appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit. He argued that a crime involving moral turpitude requires both an aggravating factor as well as physical harm or a specific intent to commit the crime.

With Telles-Carranza’s felony menacing conviction, it did not require him to cause physical harm, nor did Colorado law require someone to have a specific intent.

Case: Telles-Carranza v. Garland

Decided: July 20, 2023

Jurisdiction: Board of Immigration Appeals

Ruling: 3-0

Judges: Carolyn B. McHugh (author)

Harris L Hartz

Scott M. Matheson Jr.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit disagreed with him. Neither of those factors was required for an “assault-type offense” to involve moral turpitude, wrote Judge Carolyn B. McHugh, if there was also a “significant” aggravating factor. For Telles-Carranza, that meant his use of a deadly weapon.

“It is this placement or attempted placement of the victim in fear of imminent serious bodily injury by the use of a real, simulated, or represented deadly weapon that makes the proscribed conduct dangerous,” she wrote in a July 20 order.

The case is Telles-Carranza v. Garland.