NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
ANTELIA FIGUEROA BARRERA; KEVIN NIETO FIGUEROA,

Petitioners,

v. MERRICK B. GARLAND, Attorney General, Respondent. No. 21

- 70988 Agency Nos. A206

- 911

- 229

A206

- 911

- 230

MEMORANDUM *

On Petition for Review of an Order of the Board of Immigration Appeals Submitted June 6, 2022 * * Seattle, Washington Before: GILMAN, ** * IKUTA, and MILLER, Circuit Judges.
Petitioner s Antelia Figueroa Barrera and her son, Kevin Nieto Figueroa , seek review of an order of the Board of Immigration Appeals affirming the denial

* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36

- 3.

** The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).

*** The Honorable Ronald Lee Gilman, United States Circuit Judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, sitting by designation. 

# FILED

JUN 16 2022 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS2

of their applications for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the Convention Against T orture (CAT)

. In September 2012, Esteban Nieto Flores

— Figueroa Barrera’s husband and Kevin’s father

— was killed in Guerrero, Mexico.
Petitioners believe that Nieto Flores was killed by a drug cartel known as the “Caballeros Templar ios .” Petitioners assert that if returned to Mexico, they would be persecuted because they belong to the particular social group of “Immediate Family Members of Esteban Nieto Flores.”
The Board he ld that p etitioners’ asylum and withholding

- of

- removal claims
fail ed for lack of a nexus to a particular social grou p , and that their CAT claim s fail ed because they did not show that it is more likely than not that they would be
tortured if returned to Mex ico. We review the agency’s factual determinations for substantial evidence, and review de novo whether the agency applied the correct legal standard

. Garcia v. Wilkinson , 988 F.3d 1136, 1142 , 1146 (9th Cir. 2021). We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252, and we deny the petition for review

. 1. An applicant for asylum or withholding of removal must demonstrate
a nexus between the persecution she suffered or fears and a protected ground. Barajas

- Romero v. Lynch , 846 F.3d 351, 35 6

– 58 (9th Cir. 2017) ; Garcia , 988 F.3d
at 1143. For purposes of asylum, an applicant must show that the protected ground
is “one central reason” for her persecution

. Barajas

- Romero , 846 F.3d at 3 58 ; 8 U.S.C. § 1158(b)(1)(B)(i)

. T he nexus standard in the context of withho lding of3

removal is “less demanding ,” requiring the applicant to show only that the protected ground is “a reason” for her persecution. Barajas

- Romero , 846 F.3d at
3 60 ; 8 U.S.C. § 1231(b)(3)(C)

. Substantial evidence supports the Board’s conclusion that there was no
nexus between p etitioners’ proposed particular social group and the harm they
suffered or fear. Petitioners received a series of anonymous phone calls and text
messages that they interp reted as threatening. Figueroa Bar rera also received a text message from the Caballeros Templar ios demanding 50,000 pesos and threatening to kidnap Kevin if she did not comply. But the record does not compel the
conclusion that p etitioners received these t hreats because they wer e immediate family members of Nieto Flores

. The threat s that Figueroa Barrera received did not
mention Nieto Flores

. Nor is there evidence that the anonymous caller’s attempted

meet ing with Kevin was motivated by his familial relationship with Nieto Flores

. Though p etitioners might have been contacted by members of the Caballeros Templar ios , an applicant’s “desire to be free from harassment by criminals motivated by theft or random violence by gang members bears no nexus to a protected ground.” Zetino v. Holder , 622 F.3d 1007, 1016 (9th Cir. 2010).
Petitioners also received threats from their relative, Celica Quintana. The
Board reasonably concluded that Figueroa Barrera’s disagreement with Quintana

over the ownership of Nieto Flores’s Cadillac Escalade was a “personal dispute”4

unrelated to Figueroa Barrera’s relationship with Nieto Flores

. See Madrigal v.
Holder , 716 F.3d 499, 506 (9th Cir. 2013) (noting that “mistreatment motivated purely by personal retribu tion will not give rise to a valid asylum claim”). The Board also reasonably concluded that Quintana did not attempt to recruit Kevin
into her cartel because of “ his family relationship with [ Nieto Flores ] ,” but rather
because of a desire “ to increase the numbers and strength of her criminal organization.” See Zetino , 622 F.3d at 1016

. Substantial evidence supports the Board’s conclusion that no nexus existed between the threats from Quintana and
p etitioners’ particular social group.
2. Petitioners challenge the legal standard that the Board used to assess the nexus for the ir withholding

- of

- removal claim

. In its decision, t he Board did not distinguish between the nexus standard used for asylum (“one central reason”) and
the less demanding standard used for withholding of removal (“a reason”). But the
Board found that petitione rs “did not demonstrate a nexus between the threats they received and the proposed particular social group,” explaining that it “agree[d] with the . . . determination” of the immigration judge , who had concluded that there was “ no connection between the murder of [ Nieto Flores ] in September of 2012 and any claimed persecution relating to the [ p etitioners].” Because the Board’s d ecision is best read as finding that there was “ no nexus between the harm to [ p etitioners] and the alleged protected ground,” we conclude that “neither the5

result nor the [Board’s] basic reasoning would change , ” even under the correct standard for withholding of remov al , and therefore we need not remand to allow
the Board to apply that standard independently. Singh v. Barr , 935 F.3d 822 , 827 (9th Cir. 2019) (per curiam).
3. S ubstantial evidence supports the Board’s denial of p etitioners’ CAT

c laim s
. Petitioners were not tortured in the past, and the record provides no reason to believe that they would be tortured by or with the acquiescence of the Mexican government in the future

. PETITION DENIED.