Opinion ID: 4689051
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Substantial Evidence Supports the BIA’s

Text: Determination of No Private-Actor Persecution Applying both the unable-or-unwilling-to-control test and the condone-or-complete-helplessness test, the BIA denied Galeas Figueroa’s application for statutory withholding. Specifically, the BIA found that Galeas Figueroa had failed to establish that the Honduran government “condoned the acts of violence or is completely helpless to protect victims of crime,” or is “unable or unwilling to control the feared gangs.” BIA Op. 2–3 (AR4–5). Those factual findings are subject to substantial-evidence review and may not be set aside “unless any reasonable adjudicator would be compelled to conclude to the contrary.” 8 U.S.C. § 1252(b)(4)(B); see also Doe, 956 F.3d at 140; Mendoza-Ordonez v. Att’y Gen., 869 F.3d 164, 170 n.15 (3d Cir. 2017). Galeas Figueroa contends that two pieces of record evidence compel the conclusion that the Honduran government cannot or will not control the Mara 18 gang. First, he cites the non-investigation and non-prosecution of the gang for its repeated violence toward his family, despite the filing of multiple police reports. Second, he relies on the State Department’s country conditions report for Honduras, which identifies the Mara 18 gang as among the criminal elements that “committed murders, extortion, kidnappings, human trafficking, and acts of intimidation against police, prosecutors, journalists, women, and human rights defenders.” U.S. Dep’t of State, Bureau of Democracy, H.R. and Lab., Country Report on Human Rights Practices for 2016: Honduras 4 (2016) (AR499). 26 The BIA considered Galeas Figueroa’s evidence. It acknowledged that “multiple police reports were filed, without satisfactory results, when [Galeas Figueroa’s] family members were killed or harmed or he was threatened.” BIA Op. 2 (AR4). The BIA also recognized that, according to the country conditions report, “many murders in Honduras go unsolved,” and the government “has been unable to completely eradicate gangs.” Id. But the BIA ultimately determined that “the Honduran government has taken significant steps to combat gang violence and public corruption” – reflecting neither an inability nor an unwillingness to protect Galeas Figueroa from the gang. Id. at 2–3 (AR4–5). In addition, the BIA concluded that the lack of success in prosecuting the gang members for their past violent acts could be due to the vagueness and deficiencies in the police reports that Galeas Figueroa and his family filed – not the government’s condonation of the gang’s harmful acts or its complete helplessness to protect him. Indeed, one report was filed years after the incident, and most of the others did not even describe the assailants, let alone identify them as gang members. The BIA thus found that the record evidence, considered as a whole, was insufficient to justify relief. Because a reasonable adjudicator would not be compelled to reject that conclusion, substantial evidence supports the BIA’s denial of Galeas Figueroa’s application for statutory withholding of removal. See 8 U.S.C. § 1252(b)(4)(B); Espinosa-Cortez v. Att’y Gen., 607 F.3d 101, 106 (3d Cir. 2010) (recognizing that substantial-evidence review is “highly deferential” to the agency). 27