This study analyzes databases of merits decisions from all four levels of the asylum adjudication process: 133,000 decisions by 884 asylum officers over a seven year period; 140,000 decisions of 225 immigration judges over a four-and-a-half year period; 126,000 decisions of the Board of Immigration Appeals over six years; and 4215 decisions of the U.S. Courts of Appeal during 2004 and 2005. The analysis reveals significant disparities in grant rates, even when different adjudicators in the same office each considered large numbers of applications from nationals of the same country. In many cases, the most important moment in an asylum case is the instant in which a clerk randomly assigns an application to a particular asylum officer or immigration judge.
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=983946
'Refugee Roulette' Report Details Disparity Among Judges Granting Asylum
http://www.hispanicbusiness.com/news/newsbyid.asp?id=66426&cat=Headlines&more=/news/more-news.asp
