Nava-Patricio v. Bondi

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
• Decided: August 19, 2025
• Docket: 24-2683
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS AUG 19 2025 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

YOVANNI NAVA PATRICIO, No. 24-2683 Agency No. Petitioner, A208-028-143 v. MEMORANDUM* PAMELA BONDI, Attorney General,

Respondent.

On Petition for Review of an Order of the Department of Homeland Security

Argued and Submitted March 27, 2025 Phoenix, Arizona

Before: GRABER and BENNETT, Circuit Judges, and LEFKOW, District Judge.**

Petitioner Yovanni Nava Patricio is a native and citizen of Mexico who

reentered the United States without permission in 2024, after his initial removal in

2017. The Department of Homeland Security issued a notice of intent to reinstate

the prior removal order. Petitioner requested and received a reasonable fear

* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3. ** The Honorable Joan H. Lefkow, United States District Judge for the Northern District of Illinois, sitting by designation. interview. The asylum officer conducting Petitioner’s reasonable fear interview

made a negative reasonable-fear determination. An immigration judge (“IJ”)

affirmed the asylum officer’s determination and ordered Petitioner’s removal to

Mexico. Petitioner timely filed a petition for review. We review de novo questions

of law. Dominguez Ojeda v. Garland, 112 F.4th 1241, 1244 (9th Cir. 2024). We

grant the petition and remand.

The transcript of the hearing before the IJ covers only 5-1/2 pages, of which

about half is generic or introductory. The IJ told the pro se Petitioner, among other

things: “While the court has original review over the asylum officer’s decision, the

court will only review the testimony provided to the asylum officer in reaching his

or her decision.” (Emphasis added). As the government appropriately conceded

during oral argument, that was an erroneous statement of the law, as this court

explained in Dominguez Ojeda. See id. at 1244–45. Nor was such error harmless:

Petitioner, proceeding pro se, could not have known that the IJ was in fact required

to exercise his discretion in considering or declining to consider additional

evidence. See id. at 1244.

PETITION GRANTED; REMANDED for further proceedings

consistent with this disposition.

2 24-2683