Case ID: f-appx_355/html/0991-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Margarita GARCILAZO-CUPA, Petitioner, v. Eric H. HOLDER, Jr., Attorney General, Respondent.
    No. 05-75584.
    United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.
    
      Submitted Dec. 7, 2009.
    
    Decided Dec. 9, 2009.
    Joseph C. Hohenstein, Esq., Philadelphia, PA, for Petitioner.
    District Director, Office of the District Counsel, Department of Homeland Security, San Diego, CA, Ronald E. Lefevre, Chief Counsel, Office of the District Counsel, Department of Homeland Security, San Francisco, CA, John D. Williams, Esq., DOJ-U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Div./Office of Immigration Lit., Washington, DC, for Respondent.
    Before: HALL, THOMPSON and SILVERMAN, Circuit Judges.
    
      
       The panel unanimously finds this case suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R.App. P. 34(a)(2).
    
   MEMORANDUM

Margarita Garcilazo-Cupa petitions for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’s denial as untimely of her motion to reopen her May 12,1999 in absentia order of removal. We review for an abuse of discretion, Perez v. Mukasey, 516 F.3d 770, 773 (9th Cir.2008), and dismiss in part and deny in part the petitions for review.

We have exclusive jurisdiction over the petitions for review pursuant to 8 U.S.C. § 1252. Martinez-Rosas v. Gonzales, 424 F.3d 926, 928-29 (9th Cir.2005); Alvarez-Barajas v. Gonzales, 418 F.3d 1050, 1052-53 (9th Cir.2005). In transferring this case to us, the Third Circuit properly-treated the habeas petition filed in the district court in Pennsylvania as a petition for review requiring consideration by a court of appeals. Id.

Petitioner was personally served with her notice to appear and acknowledged in writing that she was provided with written notice and oral notice in Spanish of the time and place of her hearing and the consequences of not attending her hearing. Therefore, she could obtain reopening of the in absentia removal order only if exceptional circumstances prevented her from appearing at her hearing and she filed the motion to reopen within 180 days of the 1999 order of removal: 8 U.S.C. § 1229a(b)(5)(C)(i); 8 C.F.R. § 1003.23(b)(4)(h).

Petitioner filed her motion to reopen for exceptional circumstances over four years after the Immigration Judge ordered her removed, well beyond the 180-day deadline to reopen for exceptional circumstances. Id. The BIA did not abuse its discretion by finding the motion untimely, and for that reason we deny her petition for review.

We lack jurisdiction to consider Rojas’s equitable tolling claim because she did not assert the claim to the BIA. Serrano v. Gonzales, 469 F.3d 1317, 1319 (9th Cir.2006). That claim is dismissed. Since the timeliness issue disposes of the petitions for review, we do not reach the additional claims.

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