Case ID: f-appx_585/html/0695-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

QI CAO, Petitioner, v. Eric H. HOLDER, Jr., Attorney General, Respondent.
    No. 12-73129.
    United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.
    Submitted Nov. 18, 2014.
    
    Filed Nov. 25, 2014.
    Qi Cao, Temple City, CA, pro se.
    Dalin Riley Holyoak, Esquire, Trial, OIL, Nancy Canter, Trial, Laura Halliday Hickein, U.S. Department of Justice, Washington, DC, ICE, Office of the Chief Counsel Department of Homeland Security, San Francisco, CA, for Respondent.
    Before: LEAVY, FISHER, and N.R. SMITH, Circuit Judges.
    
      
       The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R.App. P. 34(a)(2).
    
   MEMORANDUM

Qi Cao, a native and citizen of China, petitions pro se for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (“BIA”) order dismissing her appeal from an immigration judge’s (“IJ”) decision denying her application for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the Convention Against Torture. 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. Ren v. Holder, 648 F.3d 1079, 1084-85 (9th Cir.2011). We grant the petition for review and remand.

The agency denied Cao’s claims based an adverse credibility determination. The agency’s implausibility finding regarding Cao’s employment verification letter is based on speculation and conjecture. See Jibril v. Gonzales, 428 F.3d 1129, 1136 (9th Cir.2005) (rejecting adverse credibility finding where IJ’s conclusions rested on “speculation and conjecture”). Further, the agency mischaracterized the evidence in finding that Cao admitted she told her mother and boyfriend what to write in their letters, and in finding the letters were similar. See Tekle v. Mukasey, 533 F.3d 1044, 1052-55 (9th Cir.2008) (IJ mis-characterized the evidence). Thus, substantial evidence does not support the agency’s adverse credibility determination. See Ren, 648 F.3d at 1089.

We remand this case to the BIA, on an open record, for further proceedings consistent with this disposition. See INS v. Ventura, 537 U.S. 12, 16-18, 123 S.Ct. 353, 154 L.Ed.2d 272 (2002) (per curiam); see also Soto-Olarte v. Holder, 555 F.3d 1089, 1095 (9th Cir.2009).

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