Case ID: f-appx_616/html/0232-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Carlos Mauricio TORRES-ROMERO, Petitioner, v. Loretta E. LYNCH, Attorney General, Respondent.
    No. 13-71353.
    United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.
    Submitted Aug. 25, 2015.
    
    Filed Sept. 3, 2015.
    Jeremiah Johnson, Johnson & McDermed, LLP, San Francisco, CA, for Petitioner.
    Oil, Brooke Maurer, Trial, DOJ-U.S. Department of Justice, Washington, DC, Chief Counsel ICE, Office of the Chief Counsel Department of Homeland Security, San Francisco, CA, for Respondent.
    Before: McKEOWN, CLIFTON, and HURWITZ, Circuit Judges..
    
      
       The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R.App. P. 34(a)(2).
    
   MEMORANDUM

Carlos Mauricio Torres-Romero, a native and citizen of El Salvador, petitions for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ order dismissing his appeal from an immigration judge’s decision denying his application for asylum and withholding of removal. We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252. We review for substantial evidence the agency’s factual findings, applying the standards governing adverse credibility determinations created by the REAL ID Act. Shrestha v. Holder, 590 F.3d 1034, 1039-40 (9th Cir.2010). We deny the petition for review.

Substantial evidence supports the agency’s adverse credibility determination based on the inconsistencies between Torres-Romero’s testimony and the police report regarding when police arrived on the scene to investigate the alleged home invasion, and whether the police made an arrest. See id. at 1046-48 (inconsistency regarding underlying events supported adverse credibility determination which was reasonable under the REAL ID Act’s “totality of the circumstances” standard). Torres-Romero was unable to explain the inconsistencies. See id. at 1047. In the absence of credible testimony, Torres-Romero’s asylum and withholding of removal claims fail. See Farah v. Ashcroft, 348 F.3d 1153, 1156 (9th Cir.2003).

Substantial evidence also supports the agency’s alternate finding that, even if he was credible, Torres-Romero failed to establish that he was or would be harmed on account of a protected ground. See Parussimova v. Mukasey, 555 F.3d 734, 740 (9th Cir.2009) (the REAL ID Act “requires that a protected ground represent ‘one central reason’ for an asylum applicant’s persecution”); see also Zetino v. Holder, 622 F.3d 1007, 1016 (9th Cir.2010) (petitioner’s “desire to be free from harassment by criminals motivated by theft or random violence by gang members bears no nexus to a protected ground”). Thus, we deny the petition for this reason as well. See Zetino, 622 F.3d at 1015-16.

PETITION FOR REVIEW DENIED. 
      
       This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by 9 th Cir. R. 36-3.