Rocha Rodriguez v. Bondi

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit
• Decided: March 19, 2026
• Docket: 25-317
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS MAR 19 2026 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

MARINA ROCHA RODRIGUEZ; DULCE No. 25-317 MARIA ROSAS ROCHA, Agency Nos. A209-385-904 Petitioners, A209-385-905 v. MEMORANDUM*

PAMELA BONDI, Attorney General,

Respondent.

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

Argued and Submitted March 6, 2026 Seattle, Washington

Before: PAEZ, BEA, and BRESS, Circuit Judges.

Marina Rocha Rodriguez and her daughter, Dulce Maria Rosas Rocha

(“Rocha Rodriguez” or “Petitioners”), petition for review of the decision of the

Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”), denying their applications for asylum,

withholding of removal, and protection under the Convention Against Torture

(“CAT”).

* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3. We review the BIA’s order, as well as the portions of the IJ decision that the

BIA incorporated as its own. Flores Molina v. Garland, 37 F.4th 626, 632 (9th Cir.

2022). We review denials of relief from removal for substantial evidence. Id.

Exercising jurisdiction pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1252(a)(1), we deny the petition.

1. Benito Rosas Gonzalez (“Benito”), Rocha Rodriguez’s partner and Dulce’s

father, was killed while working at a location seven hours away from his home by

car. Petitioners are not certain who killed Benito or why. About nine days after

Benito was killed, Rocha Rodriguez received an anonymous phone call telling her

to “be careful.” Neither she nor her family has received any similar contact or threats

before or after that phone call. Rocha Rodriguez and Dulce left for the United States

about one month later. Petitioners testified that since their departure, four people

close to them have been killed, but they do not know who killed them or why.

2. Rocha Rodriguez argues that Benito’s murder and the phone call she

received shortly after the murder compel the conclusion that she experienced past

persecution. We disagree.

We have “repeatedly held that threats may be compelling evidence of past

persecution, particularly when they are specific and menacing and are accompanied

by evidence of violent confrontations, near-confrontations and vandalism.” Flores

Molina, 37 F.4th at 634 (quoting Mashiri v. Ashcroft, 383 F.3d 1112, 1119 (9th Cir.

2004)). The phone call Rocha Rodriguez received, however, was not clearly a threat,

2 25-317 let alone a specific threat. The anonymous caller did not specify the basis for the

threat, any particular threatened harm, when the harm would come about, or where

it would occur. And the single act of killing Benito—with no details about the

circumstances of the killing, no other acts of violence or confrontations before

Petitioners left for the United States, and no other threats—does not compel the

conclusion that the single vague, anonymous phone call amounted to past

persecution.

3. Substantial evidence also supports the BIA’s conclusion that Rocha

Rodriguez “did not demonstrate an objectively reasonable possibility of persecution

upon [her] return to Mexico.” Rocha Rodriguez was required to present “credible,

direct, and specific evidence in the record, of facts that would support a reasonable

fear of persecution.” Kumar v. Gonzales, 444 F.3d 1043, 1054 (9th Cir. 2006)

(quoting Ghaly v. INS, 58 F.3d 1425, 1428 (9th Cir. 1995)). Given the lack of any

specific threat in the phone call that Rocha Rodriguez received and the lack of details

about Benito’s death or the killings that have occurred since she left Mexico, the

record does not compel a contrary conclusion.

Because the agency did not err in its well-founded fear determination, we need

not address the alternative conclusion that Rocha Rodriguez could safely relocate.

See 8 C.F.R. § 1208.13(b) (describing the possibility of safe relocation as relevant

only if an applicant establishes past persecution or a well-founded fear).

3 25-317 4. Because the agency did not err in its past and future persecution

determinations, it did not err in denying Petitioners’ applications for withholding of

removal. Sharma v. Garland, 9 F.4th 1052, 1066 (9th Cir. 2021).

5. Nor did the agency err in denying Petitioners’ applications for CAT relief.

Because torture is more extreme than persecution and Rocha Rodriguez was not

persecuted, the agency did not err in concluding that Rocha Rodriguez was not

tortured in the past. Hernandez v. Garland, 52 F.4th 757, 769 (9th Cir. 2022). And

substantial evidence supports the agency’s conclusion that Petitioners are not likely

to be tortured in the future. Rocha Rodriguez testified that Benito and the others

might not have been killed by gangs, and she could not identify which gang might

have killed them. Thus, even if the country reports show that gang violence goes

unchecked by Mexican officials, Rocha Rodriguez’s testimony fails to link that

evidence to her risk of harm. Accordingly, the evidence does not compel the

conclusion that state actors would likely acquiesce in the future torture of Rocha

Rodriguez. Dhital v. Mukasey, 532 F.3d 1044, 1051 (9th Cir. 2008) (per curiam).

6. The agency did not violate Rocha Rodriguez’s due process rights by

declining to decide the nexus prong of her asylum claim. To prevail on her due

process challenge, Rocha Rodriguez must show both error and prejudice—i.e., that

the outcome may have been affected by the alleged violation. Grigoryan v. Barr,

959 F.3d 1233, 1240 (9th Cir. 2020). She cannot do so here. Even if the agency had

4 25-317 made a favorable nexus finding, it still would have denied Rocha Rodriguez’s

asylum application on the independent basis that Rocha Rodriguez did not

experience past harm rising to the level of persecution and did not have a well-

founded fear of future persecution. See 8 C.F.R. § 1208.13(b) (listing essential

elements of asylum eligibility). The agency thus neither erred nor prejudiced Rocha

Rodriguez. See INS v. Bagamasbad, 429 U.S. 24, 25 (1976) (per curiam) (“Courts

and agencies are not required to make findings on issues the decision of which is

unnecessary to the results they reach.”).1

PETITION DENIED.

1 The motion to stay removal, Dkt. 3, is denied. The temporary stay of removal shall remain in place until the mandate issues.

5 25-317