Case ID: f-appx_411/html/0124-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
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Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Edras VALDEZ-GUERRA, Petitioner, v. Eric H. HOLDER, Jr., Attorney General, Respondent.
    No. 09-72638.
    United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.
    Submitted Jan. 10, 2011.
    
    Filed Jan. 24, 2011.
    Jenny Tsai, Green & Tsai, Attorneys at Law, San Francisco, CA, for Petitioner.
    Anthony Paul Nicastro, Esquire, Yanal H. Yousef, Ernesto Horacio Molina, Jr., Esquire, Senior Litigation Counsel, U.S. Department of Justice, Washington, DC, for Respondent.
    Before: BEEZER, TALLMAN, and CALLAHAN, Circuit Judges.
    
      
       The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).
    
   MEMORANDUM

Edras Valdez-Guerra, a native and citizen of Guatemala, petitions for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ order dismissing his appeal from the immigration judge’s decision denying his application for withholding of removal and relief under the Convention Against Torture (“CAT”). We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252. We review for substantial evidence the agency’s factual findings, Santos-Lemus v. Mukasey, 542 F.3d 738, 742 (9th Cir.2008), and deny the petition for review.

The record does not compel the conclusion that Valdez-Guerra’s political opinion, religion, or membership in a social group was one central reason for the MS-18 gang’s efforts to recruit or extort him. See Parussimova v. Mukasey, 555 F.3d 734, 740 (9th Cir.2009) (“[t]he Real ID Act requires that a protected ground represent one central reason for an asylum applicant’s persecution”); Barrios v. Holder, 581 F.3d 849, 855-56 (9th Cir.2009) (resistance to gang membership did not establish political opinion, and young Guatemalan men who resist gang recruitment do not constitute a particular social group). Accordingly, substantial evidence supports the agency’s denial of the withholding of removal claim because Valdez-Guerra failed to establish he was or would be persecuted on account of a protected ground. See INS v. Elias-Zacarias, 502 U.S. 478, 481 n. 1, 112 S.Ct. 812, 117 L.Ed.2d 38 (1992) (to reverse the agency’s finding “we must find that the evidence not only supports that conclusion, but compels it”) (emphasis in original).

In addition, substantial evidence supports the agency’s denial of CAT relief because Valdez-Guerra failed to establish it is more likely than not he will be tortured by or with the acquiescence of a government official if returned to Guatemala. See Arteaga v. Mukasey, 511 F.3d 940, 948-49 (9th Cir.2007).

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