Opinion ID: 3015478
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Yu’s Claim of Persecution

Text: Yu’s claim of past persecution is based upon the repercussions he allegedly sustained from violating China’s one-child policy, namely his wife’s forcible sterilization. Originally, the main evidence supporting this claim was a certificate of sterilization that Yu admitted was fraudulent after confronted with evidence denying its authenticity. Yu had made statements to various immigration officials that were consistent with the incorrect dates listed on the fraudulent sterilization certificate. In the second motion to reopen, Yu submitted a letter from his wife in which she claimed that she developed a cervix appendix cyst because of her sterilization, medical records for his wife, and 5 As with cases involving applications for asylum, this presumption may be rebutted by the government by showing that a change in circumstances has removed the basis for the applicant to have a well-founded fear of persecution or by showing that the threat is not country-wide. 8 C.F.R. § 1208.16(b)(1). 8 pictures of his house he claimed had been damaged by government officials.6 The letter from his wife is self-serving and unpersuasive in light of her willingness to submit a sterilization certificate which she knew, if her later statements are to be believed, contained the wrong date of her sterilization.7 Moreover, the medical records of Yu’s wife are merely evidence of a cyst in her cervix. The medical reports do not indicate that she was sterilized, much less forcibly sterilized.8 Finally, the pictures submitted, even if Yu and his wife are to be believed in their explanation, are not evidence corroborating that his wife had been sterilized. Given the willingness of Yu and his wife to submit documents with incorrect information, the bare assertions and meager evidence Yu and his wife provide do not support a determination that the BIA abused its discretion when concluding that Yu had not established a prima facie case. We thus deny Yu’s petition for review and affirm the BIA’s decision. 6 In his first motion to reopen, Yu submitted a letter from his wife explaining the circumstances of the fraudulent sterilization certificate and an allegedly authentic certificate of sterilization. While Yu did move to reconsider the denial of the first motion to reopen, he did not petition for review of that decision. The decision before this Court is the July 1, 2004 BIA decision which denied his second motion to reopen. 7 We express no opinion as to the truthfulness of her explanation regarding the circumstances by which she obtained the fraudulent certificate. 8 Yu makes much of the fact that one of the medical records includes the phrase “[a]fter sterilization operation.” This statement, however, is not a medical opinion finding that she had been sterilized. Instead, it is a recitation of the patient’s complaint. (App. at 44.) 9