MAN WHO WAS ADOPTED DEPORTED TO THAILAND

The Miami Herald

Adopted by an American couple 20 years ago, John Gaul III has been deported to his native Thailand.

Legislation designed to get tough on aliens who commit crimes, and a teenage run-in with the law consigned Gaul, 25, to an uncertain future Monday.

The 1996 Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act expanded the list of felonies for which non-citizens could be deported and made it retroactive.

At 19, Gaul was convicted in Tampa of writing worthless checks and stealing a car, both felonies. He served 20 months in prison and planned to apply for citizenship when he was released Dec. 31, 1996.

Immigration officials, instead, took him to a Bradenton deportation center where he stayed four months.

He was ordered back last July and remained there until his mother ended an appeals process.

Because he was adopted by Americans, he could have obtained automatic citizenship if the parents, now divorced, had applied before he became an adult, but they were unaware of that until he was 17.