Asylum Denied deals with the complex issue of immigration, and more specifically, the conflicts involved when granting or attempting to receive asylum. Asylum Denied begins by introducing the readers to Jeff Ngaruri. In 1990’s Kenya, Ngaruri leads a Tea Farmer’s boycott, which is not well received by the government. After initial threats and attempts of bribery, the government kidnaps Ngaruri, and tortures him in a water cell. After being released, Ngaruri comes in contact with members of the Peace Corps who learn of his persecution, and by a stroke of luck, manage to secure him an American basketball scholarship. After achieving multiple measures of success within the United States, his visa is nearing its expiration, so Ngaruri decides to…show more content… From there on, he experiences a plethora of bureaucratic hurdles that could easily be overcome by reforming the system to provide legal presentation to all asylum applications, creating a standardized process and criteria for assessing asylum applicants, and revising the appeal process. After denial by an immigration judge, an appeal to the BIA, and a further appeal to the Circuit Court, Ngaruri’s quest for asylum comes to a final hault. With the aforementioned reforms, applicants like Ngaruri would have a much greater rate of success at securing asylum. In the United States, anyone accused of a crime is entitled to legal counsel, regardless of whether the accused is a US Citizen or a foreign national. According to 8 U.S.C. § 1325 : US Code - Section 1325, illegal entry or immigration is a…show more content… What exactly are the criteria that determine eligibility for asylum? Applicants for asylum must prove a well founded fear of persecution based on race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a social group (AD 97). However, what criteria must be met in order to prove “well founded fear” of persecution on the basis of one or more of those factors? There is no unified code as to what constitutes proof of persecution, and each asylum officer is able to make his own guidelines as to what does. This causes many officers to approach cases with a guilty-until-proven-innocent mindset. Ngaruri’s case was deferred on the basis that he had inconsistencies in his story such as an incorrect date, and an overestimation of the amount of protesters that had joined him in the Tea Farmers’ boycott (AD 91). Considering the trauma that many asylum applicants face prior to fleeing their home country, and applying for asylum, it is understandable that they would be unable to recall every event of their stories in perfect detail. So what level of detail is necessary in order to secure asylum? How many errors should be allowed? Having documents also increases the chances of having asylum granted, but again, considering the conditions that most applicants were fleeing, it may be unfeasible in many cases to expect them to have brought documents. Some officers even adopt