2005 Decisions

Opinions of the United

States Court of Appeals

for the Third Circuit

9-30-2005

Ignatov v. Atty Gen USA

Precedential or Non-Precedential: Non-Precedential

Docket No. 04-2409

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Recommended Citation

"Ignatov v. Atty Gen USA" (2005). 2005 Decisions. Paper 501.

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 NOT PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

____________

No. 04-2409

____________

ALEKSANDAR IGNATOV,

 Petitioner

v.

ALBERTO GONZALES*, Attorney General

of the United States,

 Respondent

 

(*Substituted pursuant to Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 43(c)(2))

________________

ON PETITION FOR REVIEW OF ORDER OF THE 

BOARD OF IMMIGRATION APPEALS

(No. A79-042-836)

Argued July 12, 2005

Before: ALITO, BECKER, and GREENBERG, Circuit Judges

(Filed: September 30, 2005)

Melinda Basaran (Argued)

1061 Main Street

Paterson, New Jersey 07503

Counsel for Petitioner
2

Norah A. Schwarz (Argued)

Mary Jane Candaux

Anh-Thu P. Mai

Thankful T. Vanderstar

Linda S. Wernery

Office of Immigration Litigation

Civil Division, U.S. Dept. of Justice

P.O. Box 878, Ben Franklin Station

Washington, D.C. 20044

Counsel for Respondent

____________________

OPINION

____________________

PER CURIAM:

This is a petition for review of a decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals

(BIA), which affirmed without opinion a decision of an Immigration Judge (IJ). The IJ,

among other things, denied the petitioner’s requests for withholding of removal and

asylum. 

The principal issue presented in this case is whether the record contains sufficient

evidence to support the IJ’s finding that the petitioner did not prove that he has a well

founded fear that he would be persecuted if returned to his native country of Macedonia. 

We reject this argument and hold that the IJ’s factual findings cannot be disturbed under

the very limited standard of review set out in § 242(b)(4)(B) of the Immigration and

Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. § 1252(b)(4)(B) (requiring that a factual finding be sustained

unless “any reasonable adjudicator would be compelled to conclude to the contrary”). 
3

The petitioner in this case was an officer with the Macedonia National Police

Force. He signed an agreement to remain with the Force for eight years. During that

time, a substantial number of Albanians began to enter Macedonia, and there were

clashes between the Albanians and members of the Force. The petitioner claims that he

received reports of abuses by the Force and that he came to fear that, if he remained with

the Force, he would be compelled to participate in such activities. He therefore fled the

country. 

Petitioner’s argument is that, if returned to Macedonia, he would be persecuted

because of his political opinion, i.e., his view that the Macedonian police should not

engage in abusive acts directed at the Albanians who entered the country. In order to

establish that he is eligible for asylum, the petitioner was obligated to show (a) that the

Macedonian police were committing improper acts; (b) that they were ordered to do so

by superiors; and (c) that officers who refused to comply would be subjected to adverse

consequences severe enough to rise to the level of persecution within the meaning of the

asylum statute. For present purposes, we assume that the administrative record is

adequate to satisfy prong (a) set out above, i.e., that members of the Macedonian Police

Force engaged in widespread misconduct directed against the entering Albanians. We

likewise assume that the evidence is adequate to satisfy prong (b). After testifying that

he had received information about abuses “from couple of close friends who were my

roommates at the police academy,” the petitioner added: “They were forced to do that. 
4

That was the order to work.” A.R. 45. However, even if the evidence in the

administrative record was sufficient to compel a reasonable fact finder to conclude that

the prongs (a) and (b) were satisfied, the petitioner’s argument founders because there is

plainly insufficient evidence to compel such a conclusion regarding prong (c). 

Our review of the administrative record has not disclosed any direct evidence to

support such a finding, and at oral argument, petitioner’s counsel was unable to point to

any such evidence. We recognize that subordinates in a paramilitary organization are not

generally allowed to disobey orders without suffering adverse consequences, but we do

not believe that a reasonable fact finder would be compelled to conclude that persecution

necessarily would have followed under the circumstances present here. A reasonable

fact finder, taking into account the illegality of the orders in question and the need for the

adverse consequences to rise to the level of persecution, could, in our judgment,

reasonably reject such a finding. For these reasons, we hold that the record is adequate

to support the IJ’s rulings regarding eligibility for asylum and, a fortiori, withholding of

removal. We have considered all of the petitioner’s arguments, and see no basis for

granting the petition.