Court Opinion

ID: 9601528
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 01:46:14.73485+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:36:34.241219
License: Public Domain

TALLMAN, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
I respectfully dissent. I would agree that had the Immigration Judge (“IJ”) found Kalouma to be who he claims to be and found his testimony credible, he would be entitled to asylum. The Board of Immigration Appeals affirmed the denial because Kalouma did not meet his burden to show entitlement to asylum. It cited Matter of Burbano, 20 I & N Dec. 872, 874 (BIA 1994), and focused solely on the adverse credibility finding. We do not review the record de novo and retry the case without regard to what the IJ heard and articulated when he denied the asylum application. The IJ found Kalouma incredible, substantial evidence supports that determination, and the record does not compel a reasonable fact-finder to conclude otherwise, see Singh-Kaur v. INS, 183 F.3d 1147, 1153 (9th Cir.1999). The majority nonetheless finds that the IJ committed legal error on a separate ground regarding Kalouma’s identity that makes no difference to the ultimate conclusion. I would deny Kalouma’s petition for review based solely on the adverse credibility determination. The majority takes no issue with it and that is the end of the petition.
The IJ did not, as the majority states, impose some new, legally erroneous burden on Kalouma to prove his identity. Maj. at 1092. An asylum applicant bears the burden of proving that he is a refugee entitled to asylum. 8 C.F.R. § 208.13; Chebchoub v. INS, 257 F.3d 1038, 1042 (9th Cir.2001). Just as the government in a criminal trial bears the burden of proving that the defendant on trial is the person who committed the crime, the alien bears the burden both to establish persecution, and to prove satisfactorily who he *1093is. See Farah v. Ashcroft, 348 F.3d 1153, 1156 (9th Cir.2003) (citing identity as a key element of the asylum application). The IJ rightly questioned Kalouma’s identity based on his incredible story surrounding his claimed persecution, and doubts about an asylum-seeker’s identity can also preclude asylum. See id. There is substantial fraud in immigration matters, and we should not blind ourselves to the black market in false documentation that exists in many of these cases. See R. Wasem, Congressional Research Service, Report for Congress, Immigration Fraud: Policies, Investigations, and Issues, CRS-14 (May 17, 2007) (reporting widespread immigration fraud and citing “[t]he integrity of immigration documents and the capacity to curb immigration fraud” as “among the central themes that underlie the bigger issue of comprehensive immigration reform legislation”); see also id. (noting the likelihood that many of the estimated twelve million unauthorized aliens in the United States possess some form of an expired or counterfeit immigration document).
On this record, the IJ raised a legitimate concern over Kalouma’s identity, a concern at the heart of his asylum petition, and the inability to confirm his identity constitutes a cogent and substantial reason supporting the adverse credibility determination. After articulating reasons doubting Kalou-ma’s identity, the IJ could properly consider the lack of any proffered documentary evidence to corroborate who he says he is. See Li v. Ashcroft, 378 F.3d 959, 964 (9th Cir.2004).
Even assuming the IJ erred by imposing a new burden on asylum applicants under 8 U.S.C. § 1158(d), we should nonetheless deny Kalouma’s petition for review. The IJ here gave completely independent, sufficiently cogent, and substantial reasons for finding Kalouma incredible, and these findings went to the heart of Kalouma’s asylum application — his inability to prove his identity, inconsistencies in the alleged past persecution against him and his family, and questionable fear of future persecution based on race and religion.
I disagree with the majority’s failure to credit as an independent ground for denying Kalouma’s petition several specific adverse credibility findings, particularly those based on (1) Kalouma’s conflicting statement in his asylum affidavit that his family was “abducted” when he later testified that his family “voluntarily” left Sudan, (2) Kalouma’s inability to recall more than four incidents of personal mistreatment despite his claim that he had been beaten up many times, (3) Kalouma’s confusing and inconsistent details about his uncle’s alleged torture,1 (4) Kalouma’s omission from his asylum application of incidents of mistreatment directed at him,2 *1094(5) Kalouma’s admission to the Border Patrol that he came to the United States for an education,3 and (6) Kalouma’s return to Sudan after 1998 notwithstanding the claimed persecution against him, his uncle, and his sister.
As required by our law, the IJ identified these specific and cogent reasons for disbelieving Kalouma’s credibility, they go to the heart of his claim, and it is improper to disregard them absent evidence compelling us to do so. See Singh-Kaur, 183 F.3d at 1153. Even had the IJ committed legal error in interpreting the alien’s burden of proving his identity under 8 U.S.C. § 1158(d), we should deny Kalouma’s petition based on the IJ’s sound adverse credibility determination, the ground upon which the Board upheld the denial of asylum.
I respectfully dissent.

. In his asylum application, Kalouma stated that he “watched [his] uncle tortured and murdered in his hut in the village,” but at the merits hearing, he testified that his uncle died within the week following the torture. Given an opportunity to explain the inconsistency, Kalouma unsatisfactorily explained that his uncle was beaten in the hut, “so when they beat him he couldn’t survive,” they “had to take, rush him, no hospital[J” and "it was in the hut.” Id. Prior inconsistent statements are a classic ground to impeach a witness. See United States v. Hale, 422 U.S. 171, 176, 95 S.Ct. 2133, 45 L.Ed.2d 99 (1975) ("A basic rule of evidence provides that prior inconsistent statements may be used to impeach the credibility of a witness.”); Grunewald v. United States, 353 U.S. 391, 418-19, 77 S.Ct. 963, 1 L.Ed.2d 931 (1957) ("It is, of course, an elementary rule of evidence that prior statements may be used to impeach the credibility of a criminal defendant or an ordinary witness.”); see also Pal v. INS., 204 F.3d 935, 938 (9th Cir.2000) (concluding that testimony inconsistent with the details of the asylum application supported an adverse credibility finding).

. "Common law traditionally has allowed witnesses to be impeached by their previous failure to state a fact in circumstances in which that fact naturally would have been asserted.” *1094Jenkins v. Anderson, 447 U.S. 231, 239, 100 S.Ct. 2124, 65 L.Ed.2d 86 (1980) (citing 3A J. Wigmore, Evidence § 1042, p. 1056 (Chadbourn rev. 1970)).

. Kalouma conceded he told the Border Patrol agent not that he sought refuge from persecution but that he “came here for an education for four years before returning to Sudan.” The IJ was entitled to consider that prior statement coupled with Kalouma's long delay in seeking asylum as yet another reason to question the sincerity of the alien's claim of entitlement to it.