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not meet the criteria for transfer of jurisdiction so the
transfer request was denied.
Mr. Smith met with petitioner and Mr. Kelly on August 20,
1993. At that meeting, Mr. Smith requested that petitioners
provide certain documents. Some of the requested documents were
received by Mr. Smith on September 8, 1993. Due to his inventory
of cases, Mr. Smith decided to put petitioners’ case aside until
he received the additional information requested from
petitioners. Mr. Smith did not work on petitioners’ case from
December 1, 1993, through January 10, 1994, when he either was on
leave or attending a staff meeting.
On February 26, 1994, petitioners once again requested that
their case be transferred to New Orleans, and that request was
denied. On April 26, 1994, Appeals responded to a congressional
inquiry regarding petitioners’ request to transfer jurisdiction
to the New Orleans Appeals Office. In the letter, Appeals stated
that while the agency manual sets forth “limited exceptions to
permit the transfer of jurisdiction to another appeals office”,
petitioners did not “meet the exceptions to transfer jurisdiction
to the New Orleans Appeals Office.” Appeals further noted in the
letter that petitioners had been advised of this fact on several
occasions.
Mr. Smith never received the additional information
requested from petitioners. On September 13, 1994, he advised
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