led to Berishev’s change in status from a legal permanent resident to a United States citizen. See Aronov v. Chertoff, No. 06-11526, at 3 (D.Mass. January 30, 2007) (Gertner, J.) (unpublished opinion). Thus the dispositive question is whether the order of remand entered by this Court constitutes “judicial imprimatur” on that change. It ought be noted that a narrow and strict interpretation of Buckhannon Board and Care Home, Inc. would preclude inclusion of such an order under the definition of “prevailing party” because it constitutes neither an enforceable judgment on the merits nor a formal consent decree. See 532 U.S. at 604, 121 S.Ct. 1835, The First Circuit has not, however, spoken definitively as to whether such a narrow interpretation is required. See Smith, 401 F.3d at 23 (<HOLDING>) In Smith, the First Circuit left the issue
holding that an appellate court may not consider an issue not presented to the trial judge on appeal from final judgment on the merits recognizing that the district court did not reach the merits holding that in light of buckhannon the notion of a litigant prevailing for the purposes of the feeshifting statutes must be understood to demand some success on the merits incorporated in a judgment or other judicial decree holding that it need not reach a decision on whether a party could prevail under buckhannon in the absence of a consent decree or a final judgment on the merits holding that to be a prevailing party a plaintiff must obtain a judgment or judiciallyenforced consent decree a party does not prevail without a judicially sanctioned change in the legal relationship of the parties