Court Opinion

ID: 9407194
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-07-06 00:00:37.384941+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:20:36.029289
License: Public Domain

Case: 22-60670         Document: 00516810033             Page: 1      Date Filed: 07/05/2023

              United States Court of Appeals
                   for the Fifth Circuit
                                      ____________
                                                                                United States Court of Appeals
                                                                                         Fifth Circuit
                                       No. 22-60670
                                     Summary Calendar                                  FILED
                                     ____________                                     July 5, 2023
                                                                                  Lyle W. Cayce
   Sandrah Ache Tegwi,                                                                 Clerk

                                                                                  Petitioner,

                                             versus

   Merrick Garland, U.S. Attorney General,

                                                                                Respondent.
                      ______________________________

                         Petition for Review of an Order of the
                             Board of Immigration Appeals
                               Agency No. A213 315 740
                      ______________________________

   Before Barksdale, Elrod, and Haynes, Circuit Judges.
   Per Curiam: *
         Sandrah Ache Tegwi, a native and citizen of Cameroon, petitions for
   review of an order of the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) denying her
   motion for reconsideration; and, on remand, again denying her motion to
   reopen. (Tegwi’s briefing challenges only the denial of her motion to reopen.
   She makes no assertions concerning the denial of her motion to reconsider;

          _____________________
          *
              This opinion is not designated for publication. See 5th Cir. R. 47.5.
Case: 22-60670      Document: 00516810033           Page: 2     Date Filed: 07/05/2023

                                     No. 22-60670

   therefore, she has abandoned any challenges to denial of that motion. E.g.,
   Soadjede v. Ashcroft, 324 F.3d 830, 833 (5th Cir. 2003).)
          The remand was pursuant to our court’s granting the parties’ joint
   motion to remand for the BIA to consider whether Tegwi had a viable claim
   for ineffective assistance of counsel (IAC).        Tegwi, in pertinent part,
   maintains the BIA erred in ruling she failed to show she was prejudiced by
   her former attorney’s decision not to challenge an adverse-credibility ruling
   in her appeal to the BIA from an order of the Immigration Judge denying her
   application for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the
   Convention Against Torture.
          Because motions to reopen are “disfavored”, their denial is reviewed
   under “a highly deferential abuse-of-discretion standard”. Gonzalez-Cantu
   v. Sessions, 866 F.3d 302, 304–05 (5th Cir. 2017) (citations omitted). This
   standard requires a ruling to stand so long as “it is not capricious, without
   foundation in the evidence, or otherwise so irrational that it is arbitrary rather
   than the result of any perceptible rational approach”. Id. (citation omitted).
          To succeed on her IAC claim, Tegwi must show:                   counsel’s
   performance was constitutionally deficient; and the deficiency prejudiced
   her. E.g., Diaz v. Sessions, 894 F.3d 222, 228 (5th Cir. 2018). She has not
   shown “a reasonable probability that, but for counsel’s unprofessional errors,
   the result of the proceeding[s] would have been different”; accordingly, the
   BIA did not abuse its discretion. Id. (citation omitted).
          Because Tegwi’s IAC claim is dispositive, we need not consider her
   remaining contentions regarding her entitlement to relief. E.g., INS v.
   Bagamasbad, 429 U.S. 24, 25 (1976) (“As a general rule courts and agencies
   are not required to make findings on issues the decision of which is
   unnecessary to the results they reach.”).
          DENIED.

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