A local couple's loss of green cards they won in a visa lottery highlights the plight of thousands of people whose immigration documents are backlogged.

BY ALFONSO CHARDY

Daniel Alonso and his wife, Ana María Ochoa, of Miami Beach considered themselves the luckiest couple in the world.

Their baby daughter, Luna, was born eight months ago -- shortly after the couple learned they had won green cards in an annual visa lottery.

But their dreams crashed in the fall when the federal immigration service could not process their green cards partly because of backlogs in background checks on foreign nationals seeking immigration documents.

''We did everything by the book,'' said Alonso, 30, marketing director at a local company. "But we lost our green cards because of government negligence.''

Their case is not unique, and the government hopes to correct the problem.

Eduardo Aguirre, head of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, plans to announce in Washington today a program to reduce processing backlogs within two years. Whether the plan will speed up background checks is unclear.

SIX-MONTH GOAL

Dan Kane, an agency spokesman, declined to provide details but said the goal is to deliver immigration documents within six months.

''We are committed to a strategy that is forward looking and which has as its key component a six-month processing time for all immigration benefits by the end of 2006,'' Kane said.

Delays in processing visa lottery green cards have been common for years but they have become worse in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks because of more extensive scrutiny of all immigrants' backgrounds. Before Sept. 11, the immigration service and the State Department approved documents if they did not hear from the FBI or other security agencies within 30 days. Regulations now require statements in writing that an applicant has cleared a background check.

Backlogs and mounting complaints by immigrants and their advocates across the country have forced the immigration service to act.

The backlog-reduction plan may come too late for the Miami Beach couple.

Their lawyer, Stephen Bander, said federal rules don't allow the couple to refile their green card applications -- despite the fact they were selected in the visa lottery.

The federal statute governing visa lotteries has been interpreted to require approval of residence cards within the fiscal year that applications are submitted.

The couple filed in October 2002, the first month of the 2003 fiscal year, but did not get approval by the time the fiscal year ended Sept. 30.

Alonso said the local immigration office did not schedule an appointment until early August. Then they learned there was a holdup in the processing of their security backgrounds and fingerprints by the FBI.

''The immigration officer told us our FBI checks had not come in,'' said Alonso, a dual citizen of Britain and Venezuela. Ochoa is Colombian.

TRIED TO EXPEDITE

The FBI did not respond to a request for comment. Ana Santiago, a Citizenship and Immigration Services spokeswoman in Miami, said her agency tried to expedite the case.

''We submitted the requests for background checks in a timely manner, but did not receive them before the Sept. 30 deadline, although we did everything in our power to preclude that from happening,'' she said.

The couple sued Immigration but recently a Miami federal judge dismissed the case, Bander said. He plans to ask the local immigration district director to use his discretion and approve temporary status for the couple.

Other possible options, Bander said, include a private bill by a federal lawmaker ordering Immigration to give the couple green cards or legislation to grant green cards to people who have lost visa-lottery green cards because of administrative delays.

If none of these options works, Bander said, the couple and their daughter may have to leave the United States.