Case ID: f-appx_705/html/0618-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
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Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Gretel Noemi GARCIA-GONZALEZ, AKA Gretel Gonzalez-Villatoro and Hugo Villatoro-Garcia, Petitioners, v. Jefferson B. SESSIONS III, Attorney General, Respondent.
    No. 14-74013
    United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.
    Submitted December 4, 2017  Pasadena, California
    Filed December 6, 2017
    Catalina Gracia, Law Office of Catalina Gracia, Monterey Park, CA, Areg Kazar-yan, Law Offices of Areg Kazaryan, Glendale, CA, for Petitioners
    
      Lisa Damiano, Trial Attorney, OIL, DOJ—U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Division/Office of Immigration Litigation, Washington, DC, Chief Counsel ICE, Office of the Chief Counsel, Department of Homeland Security, San Francisco, CA, for Respondent
    Before: CALLAHAN and BEA, Circuit Judges, and WHALEY, District Judge.
    
      
       The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).
    
    
      
      
         The Honorable Robert H. Whaley, United States District Judge for the- Eastern District of Washington, sitting by designation.
    
   MEMORANDUM

Petitioners, Gretel Noemi Garcia-Gonzalez and her son Hugo Villatoro-Garcia, are natives and citizens of Guatemala. They seek review of an order of the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) denying their applications for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the Convention Against Torture (CAT). Petitioners argue they are eligible for asylum and withholding of removal under the Immigration and Nationality Act because they are members of a “particular social group” and have a well-founded fear of persecution on account of their membership in that group. See 8 U.S.C. §§ 1101(1)(42)(A) (asylum), 1231(b)(3) (withholding of removal). We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252(a), and we deny the petition.

Petitioners assert they are members of a “particular social group” consisting of people who refuse to assist gang members in their criminal enterprises. In the agency proceedings, they offered evidence of violence and threats which they and their family members faced after refusing to assist gang members in various criminal enterprises. Citing Pirir-Boc v. Holder, 750 F.3d 1077 (9th Cir. 2014), and Henriquez-Rivas v. Holder, 707 F.3d 1081 (9th Cir. 2013), Petitioners argue the BIA erred in rejecting their proposed social group without conducting a fact specific analysis. We disagree.

In addition to analogizing Petitioners’ proposed social group to others that have been rejected as particular social groups, the BIA expressly found no evidence in the record indicating that Guatemalan society views people who refuse to assist in gang criminal activity as a distinct social group. See Matter of W-G-R-, 26 I. & N. Dec. 208, 217 (BIA 2014) (“To have the ‘social distinction’ necessary to establish a particular social group, there must be evidence showing that society in general perceives, considers, or recognizes persons sharing the particular characteristic to be a group.”), vacated in part on other grounds by Reyes v. Lynch, 842 F.3d 1125 (9th Cir. 2016). Our own review of the record confirms such a lack of evidence, and the BIA’s citations to Henriquez-Rivas, Matter of M-E-V-G-, 26 I. & N. Dec. 227 (BIA 2014), and Matter of W-G-R- further suggest the BIA understood and applied the proper standard. Petitioners’ failure to provide the appropriate evidentiary support is dis-positive. See Ramirez-Munoz v. Lynch, 816 F.3d 1226, 1229 (9th Cir. 2016) (“[P]e-titioners have not supported their proposed social group of those returning home [to Mexico] who appear to be American with evidence that supports a favorable determination under the various factors we consider in determining whether a proposed group is narrowly tailored.”).

Because Petitioners did not show they were members of a cognizable particular social group, we need not address the BIA’s alternative holding that Petitioners failed to show a nexus between their membership in the specified particular social group and the basis of the feared persecution.

PETITION DENIED. 
      
       This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
     
      
      . The facts are familiar to the parties and are restated here only as necessary to resolve the issues of the petition for review.
     
      
      . Although Petitioners sought CAT relief in the agency proceedings, their petition for review challenges only the denial of asylum and withholding of removal.