Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca6-19-03733/USCOURTS-ca6-19-03733-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
William P. Barr
Respondent
Cynthia Vanessa Casilla Arrieta
Petitioner

Document Text:

NOT RECOMMENDED FOR PUBLICATION

File Name: 20a0228n.06

Case No. 19-3733

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

CYNTHIA VANESSA CASILLA ARRIETA,

Petitioner,

v.

WILLIAM P. BARR, Attorney General,

Respondent.

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ON PETITION FOR REVIEW 

FROM THE UNITED STATES 

BOARD OF IMMIGRATION 

APPEALS 

BEFORE: SILER, WHITE, and DONALD, Circuit Judges.

BERNICE BOUIE DONALD, Circuit Judge. Cynthia Vanessa Casilla Arrieta (Casilla 

Arrieta) challenges an Immigration Judge’s (IJ) and the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (BIA) 

decisions to deny her applications for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the 

Convention Against Torture (CAT). She also alleges due process errors by the IJ and BIA. The 

IJ and the BIA denied her application for asylum as untimely and her applications for withholding 

of removal and protection under the CAT on the merits. Because we do not have jurisdiction to 

review the IJ and BIA’s decisions on the untimeliness of the asylum application, we DISMISS that 

part of her petition. We DENY the rest of the petition, as we find that the IJ and BIA’s decisions 

are supported by substantial evidence and that Casilla Arrieta’s due process claims are meritless.

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I. Background

Facts

Casilla Arrieta was born in Venezuela. She is married and has two children. While her 

husband does not have legal status in the United States, her two children are both U.S. citizens. 

At the time of her removal hearing, her children were 6 and 3 years old. In 2013, a clinical 

psychologist diagnosed her older son with an autism spectrum disorder. She first traveled to the 

United States in July 2011 and stayed for three weeks. More recently, she traveled to the United 

States in September 2011 on a visitor visa. She remained in the United States even after her visa 

expired but did not file for asylum until March 2014.

Casilla Arrieta has given various reasons for failing to file for asylum. First, she found out 

that she was pregnant while on vacation and “decided to concentrate in [sic] raising [her] baby.” 

Next, she testified that she was finally stirred to action after someone kidnapped her cousin Renato1

Arrieta (Renato) in February 2014 in Venezuela following former President Hugo Chavez’s death 

and Nicolas Maduro’s elevation. In her personal statement, she also wrote that her son’s autism 

diagnosis contributed to her decision to file for asylum.

In arguing for asylum, she claims that she is scared to return to Venezuela “because [her] 

family belongs to [] political part[ies] against the government.” Casilla Arrieta, however, admits 

that she is not a member of a political party, nor is her immediate family, although she testified 

that she participated in two protests in Nashville against Maduro. Instead, her aunt, uncle, cousin, 

and grandfather are or were members of various political parties that oppose the Venezuelan 

government. She testified that her grandfather received anonymous threats that his pension would 

1 The parties use two different spellings for Arrieta’s cousin’s first name. We use the spelling used by Renato himself

in his written statement.

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be removed after “he had voted against the government,” but she admits that no one ever harmed 

him.

On the other hand, her cousin Renato has been harmed. In 2011, anonymous callers began 

threatening him almost daily. Renato went to the police, but they were unable to find out who was 

threatening him. Several years later, in February 2014, someone kidnapped Renato. Because 

Renato was blindfolded, he is not sure who kidnapped him, but he thinks that they belong “to the 

militia in Venezuela” based on their green uniforms. “He was hit in the stomach and [sustained]

a few bruises while he was kidnapped.” Casilla Arrieta testified that while in captivity, the 

kidnappers told Renato “that they knew that he had family outside of Venezuela, that they were 

traitors to the country, to Venezuela.” The kidnappers released Renato after Casilla Arrieta’s 

family paid a ransom for his release.

Casilla Arrieta’s uncle Gustavo Arrieta (Gustavo) also had issues in Venezuela. Casilla 

Arrieta testified that while participating in a peaceful protest against the government in 2017, 

Gustavo had an encounter with a policeman or security officer, and the policeman or security 

officer threatened him, told him to leave, and hit him on his left eye. Casilla Arrieta’s personal 

statement, however, was less clear on who actually hit her uncle during this incident.

In addition to her fears based on these incidents against her family, Casilla Arrieta provided

other reasons in favor of granting asylum. In her application, she wrote that the “principal reason” 

she wants legal status is due to her son’s autism diagnosis and the assistance and therapies available 

here in the United States. Although she downplayed it being the principal reason when testifying 

in front of the IJ, she did agree that her son’s diagnosis and treatment options are part of the reason

she seeks asylum.

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Procedural History

In March 2014, Casilla Arrieta filed for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection 

under the CAT. On August 5, 2014, the government served Casilla Arrieta with a Notice to 

Appear, charging her as removable, and the government filed the document on October 16, 2014. 

On December 16, 2014, Casilla Arrieta appeared before an IJ and conceded that she was 

removable.

On January 26, 2018, an IJ held a hearing on Casilla Arrieta’s applications for asylum, 

withholding of removal, and protection under the CAT. The IJ heard testimony from Casilla 

Arrieta and her sister Claudia Graziano and received documentary evidence, including Casilla 

Arrieta’s application and supporting documents. The above facts were taken from that testimony 

and those documents. Although the IJ found Casilla Arrieta and Graziano credible, the IJ denied 

each of Casilla Arrieta’s applications. 

For the asylum application, the IJ found that Casilla Arrieta failed to meet the one-year 

deadline for filing and additionally failed to meet any of the exceptions to the one-year deadline 

by showing extraordinary circumstances or changed country conditions. The IJ noted that Casilla 

Arrieta’s application “states clearly that the principle [sic] reason that she wanted to have legal 

status here was in order to obtain appropriate medical care for her child.” The IJ also noted that, 

although Maduro took over from Chavez, the two were members of the same political party. 

Finally, the IJ found that Casilla Arrieta had “failed to explain, with any detail, how country 

conditions may have changed except to say in general that they were worse.”

For the withholding of removal application, the IJ found that Casilla Arrieta failed to 

demonstrate past persecution of her or her family members based on her family’s political 

opinions. As for her cousin Renato’s kidnapping, the IJ noted that “it is unclear whether the 

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primary motivation was political or monetary because the alleged kidnappers demanded and were 

paid a ransom.” Meanwhile, the IJ explained that it is unclear whether her uncle Gustavo’s assault 

was committed by government officials, noting the lack of details or “suggestion that the acts were 

committed by military, law enforcement or government officials” in Casilla Arrieta’s personal 

statement.

Finally, for Casilla Arrieta’s application for protection under the CAT, the IJ found that 

“there is insufficient evidence that harm to her family members . . . was perpetrated by government 

officials. . . . Further, the evidence does not show that the country of Venezuela is acquiescing in 

mass human rights violations against persons similarly situated to” Casilla Arrieta. The IJ 

concluded by denying each of Casilla Arrieta’s applications.

The BIA dismissed Casilla Arrieta’s appeal. The BIA agreed with the IJ’s “conclusion that 

the respondent has not sufficiently demonstrated that her delay in filing qualifies for an exception 

to the time limitation. Moreover, even if the respondent qualified for such an exception, she failed 

to prove that she filed her asylum application within a reasonable period under the circumstances.” 

The BIA agreed that Casilla Arrieta failed to prove past persecution or to “demonstrate[] that there 

exists a reasonable possibility of future harm on account of her political or imputed political 

opinion.” The BIA also noted that Casilla Arrieta’s claims were undermined by her uncle’s and 

cousin’s continued residence “in Venezuela without significant incident or harm.” The BIA again 

agreed with the IJ “that the evidence presented does not demonstrate that [Casilla Arrieta] more 

likely than not faces harm rising to the level of ‘torture.’” Finally, the BIA rejected Casilla 

Arrieta’s newly raised due process claim, finding her assertions without merit.

Casilla Arrieta now appeals the decisions of the IJ and the BIA. She first argues that the 

BIA and IJ incorrectly determined that her asylum application was untimely and did not meet an 

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exception. Next, she argues that that the BIA and IJ committed legal error in concluding that 

Casilla Arrieta had not suffered past persecution and had not satisfied her burden of showing future 

prosecution or a likelihood of torture. Finally, Casilla Arrieta alleges that the BIA and IJ violated 

her due process rights. 

II. Asylum 

We lack jurisdiction to review Casilla Arrieta’s challenge to the IJ and BIA’s decisions to 

deny her application for asylum as untimely. Under 8 U.S.C. § 1158(a), “[n]o court shall have 

jurisdiction to review any determination of the Attorney General” for the timeliness of an asylum 

application, including the exceptions to the one-year time limit. Although there is an exception 

for “constitutional claims or questions of law,” 8 U.S.C § 1252(a)(2)(D), our Court has interpreted 

questions of law to mean “matters of statutory construction,” Shkulaku-Purballori v. Mukasey, 514 

F.3d 499, 502 (6th Cir. 2007) (quoting Almuhtaseb v. Gonzales, 453 F.3d 743, 748 (6th Cir. 2006)). 

Here, Casilla Arrieta does not make either a constitutional challenge or statutory construction 

argument; instead, she merely disagrees with the factual determinations made by the BIA and the 

IJ that she sought asylum after the deadline primarily to obtain medical care for her child—which 

did not qualify as an exception to the one-year filing requirement—and that she had not presented 

sufficient evidence of changed country conditions. See Al-Ghorbani v. Holder, 585 F.3d 980, 992 

(6th Cir. 2009) (“Because the existence of changed circumstances is an inherently factual inquiry, 

we lack jurisdiction to review the IJ’s and the BIA’s factual determinations on this issue.”);

Shkulaku-Purballori, 514 F.3d at 502 (“Shkulaku contends, under the extraordinary circumstances

exception, that the Board of Immigration Appeals erred in finding that the asylum application had 

not been timely filed. Unfortunately, this issue is jurisdictionally barred from review by this 

Court.”). As such, we lack jurisdiction to address this claim. 

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III. Withholding of Removal and Protection under the CAT 

When the BIA reviews an IJ’s decision and issues a separate opinion, we review the BIA’s 

decision as the final agency determination, but “[t]o the extent that the BIA has adopted the IJ’s 

reasoning, . . . we also review the IJ’s decision.” Al-Ghorbani, 585 F.3d at 991. We review the IJ 

and BIA’s decisions under a substantial-evidence standard. Id. “[T]he administrative findings of 

fact are conclusive unless any reasonable adjudicator would be compelled to conclude to the 

contrary[.]” 8 U.S.C. § 1252(b)(4)(B). Of course, under that standard, “[w]e may not reverse such 

findings simply because we would have decided them differently.” Al-Ghorbani, 585 F.3d at 991. 

A. Withholding of Removal

To be eligible for withholding of removal, a petitioner must establish that her “life or 

freedom would be threatened in that country because of [her] race, religion, nationality, 

membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.” 8 U.S.C. § 1231(b)(3)(A). She 

“must establish a ‘clear probability of persecution,’ meaning that ‘it is more likely than not that 

[she] would be subject to persecution.’” Al-Ghorbani, 585 F.3d at 993-94 (quoting INS v. Stevic, 

467 U.S. 407, 413, 424 (1984)). “Persecution” is “the infliction of harm or suffering by the 

government, or persons the government is unwilling or unable to control, to overcome a 

characteristic of the victim.” Khalili v. Holder, 557 F.3d 429, 436 (6th Cir. 2009) (citation 

omitted). “Persecution is an extreme concept that does not include every sort of treatment our 

society regards as offensive[,]” and “harassment or discrimination without more does not rise to 

the level of persecution.” Ali v. Ashcroft, 366 F.3d 407, 410 (6th Cir. 2004) (citations omitted). 

Here, Casilla Arrieta admits that she did not personally suffer harm or mistreatment in 

Venezuela that would constitute past persecution, but argues that the experiences of her family 

members constitute past persecution of her and establish a clear probability of future persecution. 

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She claims that the IJ and the BIA incorrectly “failed to see that [Casilla Arrieta] has shown that 

there is a clear probability that if she returns to her home country she will be persecuted because 

of her and her family’s political opinion.” The crux of Casilla Arrieta’s argument is that both her 

uncle and cousin were

participating in massive demonstrations against the Maduro government when 

Renato was “kidnapped” by civilians who subsequently tortured him. The mere 

fact that Renato’s family had to pay a ransom when he was released doesn’t mean 

they were not persecuting him on account of his membership in a political party 

that opposed Maduro. Similarly, Gustavo was participating in a massive protest 

when he was assaulted by a man riding a motorcycle with pro-Maduro stickers. 

Gustavo submitted evidence of his injuries and membership in an anti-Maduro 

party. Both incidents were more likely due to their proactive anti-Maduro political 

expression rather than mere acts of a private party.

The IJ and the BIA, however, saw the evidence differently, noting that they were unsure 

whether the attack against Renato was motivated by politics or the potential for ransom money. 

Likewise, they were not convinced that Gustavo had been attacked by government officials, based 

on the lack of detail in Casilla Arrieta’s personal statement. Finally, both noted that Gustavo and 

Renato have continued to live without incident in Venezuela. 

We cannot say that we are compelled to conclude to the contrary. 8 U.S.C. § 

1252(b)(4)(B). Even if we were to agree that “[b]oth incidents were more likely due to their 

proactive anti-Maduro political expression rather than mere acts of a private party,” substantial 

evidence supports the decisions of the IJ and the BIA that Casilla Arrieta failed to meet her burden 

of proving either past persecution or a clear probability of persecution based on the admission that 

Renato was held for ransom and the lack of detail as to who attacked Gustavo. Further, it is 

reasonable that the IJ and BIA would doubt a clear probability of future persecution because 

Renato and Gustavo have both continued to live in Venezuela without incident. As such, we will 

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not disturb the finding of the IJ and the BIA denying Casilla Arrieta’s petition for withholding of 

removal. 

B. Protection under the CAT

Likewise, we find that substantial evidence supports the decisions of the BIA and IJ that 

Casilla Arrieta did not meet her burden of proving a clear probability of torture by or with the 

acquiescence of the Venezuelan government. Similar to withholding of removal, Casilla Arrieta 

must prove that “it is more likely than not that [she] would be tortured if removed to” Venezuela

for protection under the CAT. Cruz-Samayoa v. Holder, 607 F.3d 1145, 1155 (6th Cir. 2010)

(quotations omitted). Torture is extreme and includes intentional acts to punish, intimidate, or 

coerce which cause mental or physical pain or suffering. Id. The torture must be committed by

or with the consent or acquiescence of government officials. Id. Under the CAT, the threat of 

torture must be particularized to the individual. Id.

Casilla Arrieta makes the same arguments for protection under the CAT that she made for 

withholding of removal. For the same reasons noted above, we find that the IJ and BIA’s decisions 

are supported by substantial evidence. 

IV. Due Process Claim

Finally, Casilla Arrieta makes a due process claim, but we agree with the BIA that this 

claim is meritless. We review alleged due process violations de novo in removal proceedings 

using a two-step inquiry: “first, whether there was a defect in the removal proceeding; and second 

whether [Casilla Arrieta] was prejudiced because of it.” Vasha v. Gonzales, 410 F.3d 863, 872 

(6th Cir. 2005). Although Casilla Arrieta cites to case law and regulations, she makes only a 

single-paragraph argument on this issue: “With the case at hand, the Department of State report 

clearly supported Petitioner’s claim of the abuses and persecution of the Maduro government. 

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However, the Board and the IJ’s evaluation was shallow and in some instances, totally ignored and 

not addressed.” Casilla Arrieta fails to explain how she was prejudiced, what information was 

ignored, and how it would have affected the outcome in this case. Further, “there is no evidence 

that [the IJ or the BIA] did not fairly consider [Arrieta’s] evidence.” Ndrecaj v. Mukasey, 522 

F.3d 667, 673 (6th Cir. 2008). As such, we find that this claim is without merit. 

V. Conclusion

For the foregoing reasons, we DISMISS in part and DENY in part Casilla Arrieta’s 

petition.

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