Immigration judge Samuel Der-Yeghiayan

EOIR records Samuel Der-Yeghiayan as a former immigration judge, code SD, with 3,467 proceedings completed in the five fiscal years to 2004 and 31.4% of the asylum applications decided granted, against 37.3% across the country.

American Factbook Research

What these figures are, and what they are not

None of this measures how this judge decides. Represented and unrepresented applicants have very different outcomes and a judge’s mix of the two is not the judge’s doing; so is the share of their docket that is detained, and detention courts grant asylum at a fraction of the rate other courts do. EOIR publishes representation in a table this site has not loaded, and nothing here adjusts for either.

A grant rate is over decisions, not over applications. Applications that were abandoned, withdrawn, administratively closed, transferred or not adjudicated are counted separately below and are in neither side of the rate. Across EOIR’s whole file there are more of those than there are grants and denials together.

Proceedings, not people, and a case can carry several. The figures below count proceedings and asylum applications, which are both larger than the number of people involved. Pending is a snapshot as of 2026-09-01 and moves every month.

Cases, decisions and backlog

3,467
Proceedings completed, FY2000–2004: 18.6% decided in absentia; 0
Proceedings pending at 2026-09: 31.4%
Asylum grant rate, FY2001–2003: 81 granted of 258 decided

Over the 3 fiscal years from 2001 to 2003, this judge granted 81 asylum applications and denied 177 — 31.4% of those decided, against 37.3% across the country. A further 375 ended neither way and are in neither figure.

By fiscal year

2 more columns on a wider screen

What EOIR records for immigration judge Samuel Der-Yeghiayan, by federal fiscal year
Fiscal year	Completed	In absentia	Asylum granted	Asylum denied	Neither
FY2004	4	0	0	0	4
FY2003	847	117	22	41	80
FY2002	1,651	300	40	99	205
FY2001	965	229	19	37	86
FY2000	0	0	0	0	0
FY1999	0	0	0	0	0
FY1998	0	0	0	0	0
FY1997	0	0	0	0	0
FY1996	1	0	0	0	0
FY1990	1	0	0	0	0

Complete fiscal years only. A proceeding is counted in the year it completed, which is not the year it was recorded, so this table is not a record of what arrived.

Where the proceedings were

Immigration courts where Samuel Der-Yeghiayan completed proceedings
Court	Proceedings completed
Chicago, IL (CHI)	2,102
Omaha, NE (OMA)	1,358
Kansas City, MO (KAN)	9
Los Angeles, CA (WLA)	1

The courts where EOIR records this judge completing proceedings, which is not the same as the courts they are assigned to: a judge is assigned to a median of three at once and as many as 72, and an assignment is not a posting.

Sources

EOIR immigration court outcomes by judge, court and fiscal year — U.S. Department of Justice, Executive Office for Immigration Review · retrieved September 1, 2026
EOIR immigration judges and courts

Data retrieved September 1, 2026