Morales-Guzman v. Garland

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
• Decided: December 10, 2024
• Docket: 23-3576
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED DEC 10 2024 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

REMIGIO MORALES-GUZMAN, No. 23-3576 Agency No. Petitioner, A205-318-805 v. MEMORANDUM* MERRICK B. GARLAND, Attorney General,

Respondent.

On Petition for Review of an Order of the Board of Immigration Appeals

Submitted December 3, 2024** Pasadena, California

Before: BEA, OWENS, and KOH, Circuit Judges.

Petitioner Remigio Morales-Guzman petitions for review of a decision by

the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) that dismissed his appeal of an

immigration judge’s denial of his applications for nondiscretionary withholding of

removal, 8 U.S.C. § 1231(b)(3) and 8 C.F.R. § 1208.16, and protection under the

* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3. ** The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2). Convention Against Torture (CAT), 8 C.F.R. §§ 1208.16–18. We have jurisdiction

to review the petition pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1252(a)(1). Because the parties are

familiar with the facts, we recite them only as necessary to explain our decision.

The “substantial evidence” standard governs our review of BIA decisions

regarding claims for withholding of removal and CAT protection. Garcia-Milian

v. Holder, 755 F.3d 1026, 1031 (9th Cir. 2014). Under that standard, we ask

whether the BIA’s decision is supported by “reasonable, substantial, and probative

evidence on the record considered as a whole.” Id. We must deny the petition for

review unless Petitioner can demonstrate “that the evidence not only supports, but

compels the conclusion” that the BIA’s findings and decisions are erroneous.

Plancarte Sauceda v. Garland, 23 F.4th 824, 831 (9th Cir. 2022) (citation omitted)

(as amended). Because Petitioner has not done so, we deny the petition.

1. Substantial evidence supports the BIA’s denial of Petitioner’s

application for withholding of removal because he failed to establish past

persecution in Mexico and that the Mexican government would be unable or

unwilling to protect him from the Savedra family from whom Petitioner claims he

will suffer persecution. See Wakkary v. Holder, 558 F.3d 1049, 1060 (9th Cir.

2009); Doe v. Holder, 736 F.3d 871, 877–78 (9th Cir. 2013). Petitioner did not

experience any physical harm in Mexico despite returning multiple times

voluntarily after entering the United States. The only evidence of past or future

2 23-3576 persecution that Petitioner can point to is threats against him by the Savedras. But

the law is clear that threats alone, without more, are typically not enough to

demonstrate past or future persecution. See Hussain v. Rosen, 985 F.3d 634, 647

(9th Cir. 2021). And even if these threats did demonstrate persecution, the

Mexican government’s prior investigations, prosecutions, and incarcerations of the

Savedras who killed Petitioner’s family members are more than enough to support

the BIA’s decision that Petitioner failed to demonstrate government acquiescence

to his claimed persecution. See id. at 648 (“[A] country’s government is not

‘unable or unwilling’ to control violent nonstate actors when it demonstrates

efforts to subdue said groups.”). We deny the petition as to withholding of

removal.

2. The BIA’s denial of CAT relief is also supported by substantial

evidence, and for similar reasons. Petitioner has not put forth evidence that

compels the conclusion that the BIA erred in finding he was unlikely to be tortured

if removed to Mexico. See Garcia-Milian, 755 F.3d at 1033. The evidence of

prior government prosecutions of the Savedra family’s violent criminals again

supports the BIA’s conclusion that Petitioner failed to demonstrate that the

Mexican government would acquiesce to any future torture, even if he could

establish a likelihood of future torture. See Zheng v. Ashcroft, 332 F.3d 1186, 1188

(9th Cir. 2003). And the BIA’s finding that Petitioner could simply relocate to

3 23-3576 another area of Mexico to avoid any future torture is separately dispositive. See

Aguilar Fermin v. Barr, 958 F.3d 887, 893 (9th Cir. 2020) (affirming denial of

CAT relief where substantial evidence supported conclusion that alien could

relocate within Mexico to avoid any future torture). Petitioner does not point to

any evidence to suggest that finding is erroneous. We accordingly deny the

petition as to CAT relief.

PETITION DENIED.

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