U.S. adoptee a stranger in his birthplace

Burglary conviction leads to deportation

July 20, 2008

Leslie Berestein

UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER

A man adopted by a U.S. couple when he was 6 months old has been deported to El Salvador after spending five years in immigration detention in Otay Mesa while he appealed his case.

, 29, arrived in El Salvador on July 10 after losing his appeal to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals last spring, a proceeding that stemmed from a burglary conviction 11 years ago. Described by his father as “a middle-class white kid” raised in an Anglo household, Mustanich learned a handful of Spanish words from Latino detainees while in immigration detention, but is otherwise starting over as a stranger in a strange land.

Speaking by phone Friday from a San Salvador hotel, he described going through customs at the airport.

“They brought out some guy, and he asked, 'Why don't you speak Spanish?' ” Mustanich said. “I told him it was because I was adopted, and he said, 'Then why are you here?' ”

Mustanich's case is rare. But foreign adoptees occasionally land in deportation proceedings, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, usually after getting into trouble with the law and learning that their parents, who brought them into the United States legally, did not complete the process of making them citizens.

Not long ago, ICE deported another foreign adoptee held in San Diego, a man adopted in 1959 from Japan when he was 1.

While a 2000 law made citizenship virtually automatic for most adopted children brought into the United States, it doesn't apply retroactively.

Mustanich landed in prison as a teenager after he and some friends burglarized his father's house. His father, hoping to scare him straight, called the police. Jess Mustanich's resulting conviction for residential burglary set in motion a series of events that his father did not imagine.

“I was trying to do the right thing for my kid,” said Bill Mustanich, 61, of San Jose. “Every time I think about this, I think about throwing up. What am I going to do about him now?”

Bill Mustanich, who recently retired from his job as a school adviser for troubled teens, said he tried on several occasions to naturalize his son. He and his wife adopted their son under Salvadoran law through an agency in 1979; the couple divorced before they followed through on naturalizing Jess.

After the dust settled, Bill Mustanich hired a family law attorney to complete the process; his son was about 5. The attorney ran into roadblocks, including changes in the law and the fact that the adoption agency was no longer in business.

In 1988, with his son in tow, Bill Mustanich took a completed citizenship application to an Immigration and Naturalization Service field office in San Jose, he said, but they were turned away and given a phone number to call. Bill Mustanich said he called several times and left messages, but never received a reply.

Meanwhile, Jess Mustanich was growing up and he began to act out, experimenting with alcohol and drugs and getting into trouble. Shortly after his 18th birthday, Jess Mustanich and several friends who had been stealing from their parents burglarized his father's home. The police were called and, Jess Mustanich was convicted of residential burglary in 1997.

Neither father nor son knew at the time that changes to immigration law enacted the previous year had eliminated most legal relief for legal U.S. residents convicted of a crime.

According to immigration officials, Jess Mustanich matched the definition of a deportable alien, regardless of his adoption background. In 2003, after his release from prison, he was placed in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement to await deportation.

“He had a criminal conviction that made him removable, and our job is to comply with what the judge orders,” said Lauren Mack, an agency spokeswoman in San Diego.

At a hotel now for more than a week, Jess Mustanich isn't sure what to do next. His father can provide financial support, and members of a local branch of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, of which he is a member, have helped get him oriented.

Bill Mustanich, who referred to ICE as “an agency out of control,” plans to travel to El Salvador, though he feels helpless.

“It's a country in turmoil,” he said. “I am terrified about his ability to move around. The whole thing is just appalling.”

Jess Mustanich said he would like to return home one day, but realizes it's unlikely. He recently bought a copy of “The Complete Idiot's Guide to Intermediate Spanish” at a bookstore.

“It's going to take some time,” he said. “Until then, I'm going to have to rely on hand signals.”

Leslie Berestein: (619) 542-4579; leslie.berestein@uniontrib.com