Opinion ID: 2567
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Ji Wen Shi

Text: In July 1992, Ji Wen Shi, a native of Changle City in Fujian Province, attempted to enter the United States unlawfully. Failing to appear for his removal proceedings in January 1993, Ji Wen Shi was initially ordered removed in absentia.
In fact, Ji Wen Shi remained in this country illegally for several years, marrying another Chinese national in 1999 and fathering his first child, a son, in 2000. In May 2001, while his wife was pregnant with the couple's second son, Ji Wen Shi moved to reopen his removal proceedings, attributing his 1993 absence to getting lost on the way to the immigration court as the result of taking the wrong bus. Because the agency granted the motion, we have no reason to consider Ji Wen Shi's eight-year delay in proffering this explanation. We note only that, upon reopening, Ji Wen Shi applied for asylum, withholding of removal, and CAT relief based on a purported fear that, if he and his wife were to return to China, one or the other would be forcibly sterilized for having violated the country's one-child policy. In addition, Ji Wen Shi claimed that he feared that he would be jailed, beaten, and tortured upon return to China because he had left the country without authorization. Finding Ji Wen Shi to have testified credibly, the IJ concluded that petitioner had established that he had a well-founded fear of being forcibly sterilized on return to China and granted him asylum. See In re Ji Wen Shi, No. A 72 459 654 (Immig. Ct. N.Y. City May 16, 2003).
On appeal to the BIA, the government argued that, as a matter of law, Ji Wen Shi did not fit within the statutory definition of a refugee because he had not been subjected to any coercive measures and his fear of future mistreatment was merely speculative. In reversing the IJ's grant of relief from removal, the BIA did not attempt to resolve the government's legal challenge categorically. Instead, focusing on the record evidence developed in the particular case, the BIA ruled that, even if Ji Wen Shi had demonstrated a credible subjective fear of future sterilization, he had failed to adduce evidence demonstrating that his fear was objectively reasonable. See In re Ji Wen Shi, No. A 72 459 654 (B.I.A. Sept. 14, 2004). The BIA particularly noted the lack of evidence of any national Chinese policy regarding the treatment of parents of foreign-born children. To the extent Ji Wen Shi attempted to fill this gap with an affidavit from demographer John Shields Aird indicating that persons returning to China from abroad with unauthorized children can hardly expect to be afforded leniency under the nation's one-child policy, the BIA concluded that this evidence showed only that Ji Wen Shi may face sanctions and penalties upon return to China, not that those penalties would rise to the level of persecution. Id. at 2. The BIA further determined that the possibility of Ji Wen Shi and his wife having another child was too speculative to warrant relief from removal. See id. As to Ji Wen Shi's assertion that he feared incarceration in light of his illegal departure from China, the BIA concluded that petitioner had failed to demonstrate that any punishments imposed would, in fact, amount to torture under the CAT, or be based on any of the enumerated protected grounds under the INA. See id. at 1-2.
Ji Wen Shi petitioned this court for review but, in January 2006, before the case was heard, the parties stipulated to a remand to allow the BIA (1) to address evidence accompanying the Aird affidavit, (2) to explain further its conclusion that Ji Wen Shi had not demonstrated an objectively reasonable fear of forced sterilization if returned to China, and (3) to consider Ji Wen Shi's claim in light of this court's recent decision in Jian Xing Huang v. INS, 421 F.3d 125.