Some undocumented immigrants who say U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services passed over their U Visa applications have standing to sue, a federal judge in the Southern District of California ruled Tuesday afternoon. U visas — special visas given to immigrant victims of certain crimes. U visas are intended to help law enforcement investigate serious crimes like trafficking, torture and murder, and are meant to encourage more reporting of crime in undocumented immigrant communities. The act sets an annual cap of 10,000 visas. The plaintiffs say they filed for U visas in 2017, but have been on a waitlist ever since. They say that their applications have been passed over in favor of applications filed after 2017, in a violation of immigration services’ own regulations, which state that the oldest applications are to receive the highest priority. U.S. Senior District Judge Thomas Whelan wrote in his 12-page opinion that the plaintiffs properly stated a claim for relief under the Administrative Procedure Act because immigration services had engaged in “unreasonable delay,” in processing the applications. “After this lawsuit was filed, several of the original plaintiffs received an intervening final agency decision. Thus, at least ‘some possibility’ exists that USCIS reconsidered and acted on those pending petitions,” Whelan said. While some of the original 24 plaintiffs were voluntarily dismissed over lack of jurisdiction, other plaintiffs were dismissed from the action because immigration had since processed their applications, rendering their claims moot.