NOT FOR PUBLICATION

 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

PAUL SOTO BARRIOS, 

Petitioner, 

 v. 

WILLIAM P. BARR, Attorney General,

Respondent.

No. 17-72728

Agency No. A079-355-978

MEMORANDUM*

On Petition for Review of an Order of the

Board of Immigration Appeals

Submitted September 4, 2020**

Seattle, Washington

Before: HAWKINS and McKEOWN, Circuit Judges, and CALDWELL,***

District Judge.

Paul Soto Barrios, a native and citizen of Mexico, petitions for review of the 

Board of Immigration Appeals’ (BIA) decision affirming an immigration judge’s 

* 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 Karen K. Caldwell, United States District Judge for 

the Eastern District of Kentucky, sitting by designation.

FILED

SEP 9 2020

MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK

U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
2 

(IJ) denial of withholding of removal and protection under the Convention Against 

Torture (CAT). Barrios fears persecution by members of the Sinaloa drug cartel on 

account of his relationship to his father, whom Barrios believes was murdered by 

cartel members for allegedly serving as a police informant, as well as torture by local 

police in Tuxpan, Nayarit. We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252, and we deny 

Barrios’s petition. 

Substantial evidence supports the agency’s conclusion that Barrios failed to 

establish that it was more likely than not that he would be persecuted by the Sinaloa 

cartel in Mexico. See Flores-Vega v. Barr, 932 F.3d 878, 886 (9th Cir. 2019). As 

the IJ and BIA discussed, it is not entirely clear from the evidence in the record who 

killed Barrios’s father or why. Plus, Barrios’s father was killed in the United States, 

not Mexico, and there was no evidence that either Barrios or any of his family 

members were threatened or harmed by the Sinaloa cartel in Mexico since his 

father’s death. Given these facts, the IJ and BIA agreed that Barrios’s fear of 

persecution at the hands of the Sinaloa cartel was simply too speculative to qualify 

him for withholding. Ultimately, the agency’s factual findings are conclusive, see 

Garcia-Milian v. Holder, 755 F.3d 1026, 1031 (9th Cir. 2014), and the evidence in 
3 

the record does not compel a contrary result, see Flores-Vega, 932 F.3d at 886. 

Thus, Barrios’s withholding claim fails.1

Substantial evidence also supports the agency’s denial of Barrios’s CAT 

claim. To be sure, the BIA first determined that Tuxpan police officers had tortured 

Barrios in 2014. That is significant because “‘past torture is ordinarily the principal 

factor on which we rely when an applicant who has been previously tortured seeks 

relief under the Convention.’” Avendano-Hernandez v. Lynch, 800 F.3d 1072, 1080 

(9th Cir. 2015) (quoting Nuru v. Gonzales, 404 F.3d 1207, 1217 (9th Cir. 2005)). 

Indeed, “absent changed circumstances, ‘if an individual has been tortured and has

escaped to another country, it is likely that he will be tortured again if returned to the 

site of his prior suffering.’” Id. (quoting Nuru, 404 F.3d at 1217–18). That said, the 

IJ and BIA carefully balanced this evidence of past torture against the other relevant 

evidence in the record and concluded that Barrios had not met his burden. See 8 

C.F.R. § 1208.16(c)(2), (3). 

With respect to the issue of internal relocation, the IJ observed that, after the 

incident in Tuxpan, Barrios moved to Tijuana, where the interactions he had with 

law enforcement largely involved questioning and a search of his vehicle; there was 

no evidence that he was arrested or physically harmed, let alone tortured. As for 

1 Although Barrios previously asserted other withholding claims, he has 

since waived those claims.
4 

country conditions, the IJ discussed the U.S. Department of State’s Human Rights 

Report for Mexico at length and pointed out that the Mexican government has taken

some action against those who commit torture, including law enforcement officers. 

The IJ also found that the evidence did not show the existence of gross, flagrant, or 

mass human rights violations in Mexico. Finally, the IJ discussed evidence specific 

to Nayarit, the Mexican state where Barrios was harmed, and highlighted the fact 

that U.S. officials recently arrested Nayarit’s former attorney general on federal drug 

charges. The IJ even cited statements from the Governor of Nayarit pledging to 

uphold public safety and ensure that the state is “one of the safest” in Mexico. The 

BIA then discussed the IJ’s factual findings at length and determined that they were 

not clearly erroneous. See Guerra v. Barr, 951 F.3d 1128, 1133–34 (9th Cir. 2020) 

(explaining that the BIA only reviews the IJ’s factual findings for clear error). The 

record simply does not compel a contrary conclusion. Therefore, Barrios’s CAT 

claim also fails.2

PETITION DENIED. 

2

In assessing the overall risk of torture, the IJ also recognized that 

Barrios had not been harmed, threatened, or tortured in the past by the Sinaloa cartel. 

The BIA then noted that Barrios’s CAT claim focused on his fear of the Mexican 

police and, in any event, he failed to demonstrate either that he would likely be 

tortured by cartel members or that Mexican officials would acquiesce to such harm. 

Barrios does not meaningfully challenge these findings in his opening brief to this 

Court, and, even if he did, he has not demonstrated any agency error justifying 

reversal.