Court Opinion

ID: 9378748
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-03-13 15:00:49.424429+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:15:54.752753
License: Public Domain

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                                                   [DO NOT PUBLISH]
                                    In the
                 United States Court of Appeals
                         For the Eleventh Circuit

                          ____________________

                                 No. 22-11867
                           Non-Argument Calendar
                          ____________________

        WINDELL GORDON,
                                                                Petitioner,
        versus
        U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL,

                                                               Respondent.

                          ____________________

                    Petition for Review of a Decision of the
                         Board of Immigration Appeals
                           Agency No. A078-085-496
                           ____________________
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        2                         Opinion of the Court                     22-11867

        Before LUCK, BRASHER, and ANDERSON, Circuit Judges.
        PER CURIAM:
               Windell Gordon petitions for review of the Board of Immi-
        gration Appeals’ order affirming the denial of his application for re-
        lief under the Convention Against Torture. After careful review,
        we partly dismiss and partly deny Gordon’s petition.
            FACTUAL BACKGROUND AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
              Gordon is a Jamaican native and citizen. He came to the
        United States in 1997 on a student visa. Ten years later, he was
        convicted of cocaine-trafficking offenses and sentenced to 156
        months’ imprisonment. Gordon was released from prison in
        2015—after successfully seeking a two-level sentence reduction—
        and the government then ordered him deported as a noncitizen
        convicted of an aggravated felony. After an asylum officer deter-
        mined Gordon had established a reasonable fear of persecution, he
        applied for deferral of removal under the Convention.1
                                  The Record Evidence
              The immigration judge held two merits hearings on Gor-
        don’s application. Gordon testified, as did his cousin Kingsley

        1
          Gordon also applied for withholding of removal under 8 U.S.C. section
        1231(b)(3)(A), but he conceded his ineligibility before the immigration judge.
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        22-11867               Opinion of the Court                         3

        Gayle and Dr. Damion Blake, an expert on “the intersection of pol-
        itics, government, organized crime, and gang violence” in Jamaica.
               Gordon testified that his best friend growing up—Reeve
        Bullock, called Bulla—operated a “small time” drug trafficking or-
        ganization that purchased marijuana from police officers and dis-
        tributed the drugs locally. As Bulla’s close, trusted friend, Gordon
        was often present during these purchases and thus recognizable to
        the officers involved. People in Jamaica (and in Bulla’s organiza-
        tion) knew him by the alias Panther.
              After Gordon left for the United States, Bulla’s trafficking or-
        ganization graduated to cocaine—and expanded its market to other
        Caribbean nations and the United States. Gordon testified that, as
        the operation expanded, so did involvement of (and investment by)
        government officials of many stripes—including police officers, im-
        migration and customs officials, and members of parliament.
               Eventually, Gordon needed money and so re-engaged with
        Bulla’s organization. He mostly worked with Edwin Murphy—
        whose job it was to retrieve the cocaine Bulla’s organization im-
        ported using cruise ship workers—to distribute the drugs in Flor-
        ida. But Gordon could also name Jamaican officials he’d either seen
        or spoken to by telephone. Bulla’s brother-in-law, Delroy Hislop,
        was involved too. In 2004, Hislop was robbed of $130,000 and
        killed (in a car rented in Gordon’s name) during a botched drug
        deal in Tampa.
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        4                      Opinion of the Court               22-11867

                Within the year, Gordon stopped distributing for Bulla.
        Gordon testified that Bulla and his organization accused him of ar-
        ranging Hislop’s murder. Gordon said Murphy also told the organ-
        ization’s members that Gordon had snitched in exchange for his
        early release from prison. For these reasons, Gordon feared he’d
        be killed by Jamaican officials involved in the organization—in ret-
        ribution for snitching and for Hislop’s murder, and to protect
        themselves—if he ever returned to Jamaica. Because of its connec-
        tions with customs and immigration officials, the organization
        would be promptly alerted to Gordon’s arrival. And because the
        people he could turn to for protection also wanted him killed, he
        wouldn’t be safe anywhere in Jamaica.
                Gordon described five episodes underlying his fear of execu-
        tion should he return to Jamaica. First, Bulla and others in his or-
        ganization threatened Gordon several times by telephone. The
        first time was shortly after Gordon’s 2007 sentencing, when Bulla
        warned him not to do anything stupid because “Delroy’s death is
        also hanging over your head and it won’t be pretty.” After Gor-
        don’s 2015 release, Bulla again threatened Gordon, this time using
        a Jamaican expression (“suck ya motha”) meaning “we’re going to
        kill you or[,] wherever we see you, we’re going to hurt you.” Gor-
        don also testified that he received anonymous threatening calls “on
        numerous occasions.”
               Second, in 2015, the organization tried to orchestrate an at-
        tack on Gordon in prison by having Hislop’s brother accuse him of
        stealing $250,000 from another prisoner. Third, Gordon said his
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        22-11867              Opinion of the Court                       5

        cousin Gayle also received threats. While visiting Jamaica in 2015,
        “unknown assailants” hijacked Gayle’s car, “took [him] out of the
        car,” searched the car for Gordon, and told Gayle to “let [Gordon]
        know that [he] must remember Delroy’s death” and that they’d
        heard he was an informant. Fourth, Gordon said Bulla and others
        “look[ed] for [and] ask[ed] questions about [Gordon]” at his dad’s
        2017 funeral—which he’d promised his dad (who had received
        “many messages” threatening Gordon’s life if he snitched) he
        wouldn’t travel to Jamaica to attend.
               Fifth and finally, Gordon testified that many of his Tampa
        drug distributors—including Lassie, Hot Beer, Rankin Bernard,
        Jaro Kelly, Delroy Diar, Eelie, Omar, and Blue Boy—were mur-
        dered by the organization after returning to Jamaica because of
        their assumed involvement, as Gordon’s associates, in Hislop’s
        death. According to Gordon’s testimony and filed declaration, Las-
        sie was killed in a police shootout “[b]ecause . . . he was a known
        thief or a known gunman” and “a troublemaker kid from Jamaica”;
        Hot Beer was shot by “[u]nknown assailants” in 2018, three years
        after being deported; in 2013, Rankin Bernard (an American citi-
        zen) was killed by police while vacationing in Jamaica; and Jaro
        Kelly—who had fled from the United States to Jamaica while on
        bond—was killed in 2003 on a boat between the Bahamas and the
        United States because Bulla’s organization assumed he was going
        back to cooperate. As for the others, Gordon offered evidence only
        about roughly when the men were killed.
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        6                       Opinion of the Court                  22-11867

                On cross-examination, the government asked why Gordon
        didn’t file death certificates or other corroboration of his Tampa
        distributors’ deaths. The immigration judge likewise questioned
        how Bulla’s organization could find and kill the men yet Gordon
        couldn’t track down documentation about their deaths—and how
        Gordon knew the men had been murdered because of their associ-
        ation with Gordon and not for some other reason. Gordon said he
        only knew the Tampa distributors’ aliases (which Dr. Blake testi-
        fied is common in Jamaica). Because the men were “known” by
        those aliases in Jamaica, they would’ve been easy to locate on the
        ground or through customs officials; however, Gordon said calling
        locals to ask for information (like the men’s real names) would’ve
        raised red flags. As for how he knew why the men were killed,
        Gordon said he was the only connection between these men and
        Bulla’s organization, so the organization assumed they were in-
        volved in Hislop’s death.
                The government also emphasized that Bulla and the traffick-
        ing organization had never harmed Gordon’s family. The immi-
        gration judge raised this issue, too, pointing out that their failure to
        harm his family seemed to show “[t]hey clearly then think that
        [Gordon] hasn’t spoken to the DEA.” And the government queried
        why an organization so connected to immigration and customs of-
        ficials needed to hijack Gordon’s cousin’s car—or attend his fa-
        ther’s funeral—to determine whether he was in Jamaica. Finally,
        the government highlighted the lack of evidence—other than Gor-
        don’s testimony—about Bulla’s drug trafficking organization,
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        22-11867               Opinion of the Court                         7

        questioning why Gordon hadn’t filed any documents or news cov-
        erage corroborating its existence. Gordon said the organization “is
        not publicly known” and deliberately “stay[s] below the radar of
        the public.”
               Turning to Gordon’s expert witness, Dr. Blake testified that
        Gordon’s description of Bulla’s trafficking organization was “quite
        compelling”—and that he wasn’t surprised the organization wasn’t
        publicly known. But he also said he’d “never really heard” of a sit-
        uation where government officials were involved in the narcotics
        business as investors. And he admitted that he’d never heard of
        Reeve Bullock before talking to Gordon.
                Still, Dr. Blake expressed the opinion that, if Gordon re-
        turned to Jamaica, he’d be in “imminent danger of threats against
        his life . . . because of the perception that . . . he’s an informant”
        (which, in Jamaica, is assumed once a person’s been incarcerated)
        and because of “the perception and the allegations of his involve-
        ment in” Hislop’s death. In his expert report, Dr. Blake said the
        attempted “hit” while Gordon was imprisoned showed that Bulla’s
        organization has a “death vendetta” against him which will be ac-
        tivated if Gordon returns to Jamaica. Dr. Blake testified that gov-
        ernment officials would know immediately when Gordon arrived,
        and there was nowhere Gordon could go within the small, “hyper-
        vigilant” country to be safe. The lack of harm thus far to Gordon’s
        family didn’t counsel otherwise, Dr. Blake explained, because peo-
        ple with “elder status” are viewed with respect and “so oftentimes
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        8                      Opinion of the Court                22-11867

        they don’t become part of the . . . dragnet of . . . revenge and re-
        prisal.”
                Dr. Blake opined that police or customs officials would ei-
        ther harm Gordon directly or communicate his location to Bulla’s
        organization, then “essentially not provide any protection if he
        were to be so attacked”—both to rid Jamaica of a “bad apple” (as
        criminal deportees are viewed there) and to protect their secrets
        “about the nature, about the structure, and the operation of
        [Bulla’s] organization.” The immigration judge (and the govern-
        ment) pressed Dr. Blake about whether these officials would tor-
        ture or kill Gordon under color of law. Dr. Blake described “death
        squads” of uniformed police carrying out extrajudicial “execution-
        style killings.” But he couldn’t identify any specific government
        official likely to harm Gordon. And he acknowledged that an in-
        ternal affairs-type entity (INDECOM) investigates corrupt police
        officers, leading to convictions (albeit rarely).
               Gayle, Gordon’s cousin and final witness, testified that he
        believed Gordon’s life would be in danger should he return to Ja-
        maica. Gayle explained that, while visiting Jamaica in 2007, he re-
        ceived “the threat of [his] life,” “the worst thing [that] ever hap-
        pen[ed] to [him].” Early one morning, when he and a friend de-
        parted to visit a remote area, Gayle noticed a “strange vehicle” in
        the neighborhood. About five minutes into their drive, while on
        “a dark stretch of road,” Gayle saw a car approaching—at first, its
        headlights were off; then they began flashing. Gayle was afraid, so
        he sped up but “could not outrun” the car, which tried to push him
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        22-11867               Opinion of the Court                        9

        off the road. Eventually the car passed him and then blocked the
        road; “two guys jump[ed] out . . . and came back running up to
        [Gayle’s] car looking all crazy in their eyes.” The men asked for
        Gayle’s and his friend’s names, then “shout[ed] back to somebody
        in the [other] car and said he’s not here.” The men then asked
        Gayle “where is Panther?”; after Gayle said he didn’t know, the
        men drove off. Eventually Gayle and his friend continued on their
        way, and the car passed theirs twice more with its brights on.
        Gayle said he didn’t know the men and couldn’t tell whether they
        were police or civilians. On cross-examination, Gayle acknowl-
        edged he’d returned to Jamaica many times since then without be-
        ing threatened or harmed, although he said that’s because he “did
        not go into places.”
                Finally, Gordon filed numerous documents in support of his
        application. He submitted corroboration that Hislop died in April
        2004. He submitted news reports about the arrest of Edwin Mur-
        phy in 2003 for smuggling cocaine via cruise ship workers. He also
        filed articles about the death of Hot Beer—which described him as
        a “violence producer . . . in and out of hot water with the law”
        (“constantly under the police radar”) and indicated that, in 2018, he
        was “ambushed by a group of armed men who shot him multiple
        times.” And he filed a news report about the murder of Omar—
        described as “one of Montego Bay’s notorious gangsters,” sus-
        pected of multiple murders and “feared by many, including fellow
        gangsters”—who was killed in a drive-by shooting shortly after his
        2017 deportation. Gordon also submitted general news articles
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        10                     Opinion of the Court                 22-11867

        about extrajudicial killings of “condemned criminals” in Jamaica,
        ordered by senior police officers and staged as shootouts; corrupt
        police officers feeding informants’ names to gangs; the relationship
        between drug organizations, police, and politicians in Jamaica; and
        mass burial sites used by “the criminal underworld, often assisted
        by rogue policemen.” Finally, Gordon filed numerous country
        condition reports.
                               The Agency Decisions
               The immigration judge denied Gordon’s application. The
        immigration judge concluded that, without corroboration, Gordon
        had failed to sustain his burden of proof because his testimony, “alt-
        hough generally credible,” conflicted at times with other record ev-
        idence and “lacked specificity[,] as [Gordon]’s answers were gener-
        ally vague and broad.” In particular, Gordon failed to establish the
        circumstances of his Tampa distributors’ deaths, the motivation for
        those killings, and the connection between the killers and govern-
        ment actors—“details that go to the heart of [Gordon]’s claims.”
        The immigration judge also determined Gordon failed to establish
        the government officials’ involvement as investors, a feature of
        Bulla’s organization that Dr. Blake considered novel.
               The immigration judge further concluded that Gordon’s
        corroborating evidence didn’t satisfy his burden of proof. Specifi-
        cally, Gordon failed to provide affidavits from people in Jamaica
        with knowledge about the deaths of Gordon’s Tampa distributors.
        He also failed to submit death certificates. Although Gordon as-
        serted that aliases are the norm in Jamaica and so he didn’t know
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        22-11867               Opinion of the Court                       11

        the men’s real names, the immigration judge observed that Gor-
        don had been in business with the men for years in Tampa, not
        Jamaica. Plus, the news articles Gordon filed about Hot Beer and
        Omar undermined rather than corroborated Gordon’s version of
        events, “provid[ing] a different light to the motives behind the
        deaths.”
                The immigration judge also determined, in the alternative,
        that Gordon’s claim for relief failed on the merits. Gordon needed
        to establish—by more than a series of suppositions—that he’d
        more likely than not be tortured by a public official acting in his
        official capacity (or at the instigation of, or with the acquiescence
        of, such an official) if removed to Jamaica. But the immigration
        judge found no record evidence “that anyone in Jamaica, much less
        the government, is looking for [Gordon] to torture and kill him.”
        Gordon hadn’t suffered past torture, and Gayle (who the immigra-
        tion judge found to be credible) testified only that the people who
        stopped his car had asked for Panther—not that they’d harmed
        Gayle or accused Gordon of Hislop’s death “or anything else.” Ad-
        ditionally, the immigration judge observed that, “despite [Gor-
        don]’s assertion that Bulla believes he cooperated” with American
        authorities, Gordon’s family remained unharmed—and “elder sta-
        tus” could explain Gordon’s mother’s safety but not his brother’s.
        Same for Edwin Murphy, who served only six years of his twenty-
        year sentence (because he cooperated) yet now lives in Jamaica un-
        harmed. These facts, the immigration judge concluded, weighed
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        12                     Opinion of the Court                 22-11867

        against finding that Gordon was at risk of torture for being a per-
        ceived snitch.
                The evidence of the Tampa distributors’ deaths didn’t help,
        the immigration judge found, because the record suggested more
        plausible explanations for the killings than those Gordon asserted.
        Gordon’s own testimony “ma[de] the [immigration judge] believe
        that Lassie was killed because he was a ‘known gunman’ who was
        involved in a shootout with the Jamaican police.” Likewise for Jaro
        Kelly, who Gordon said was killed because he tried to return to the
        United States, not because of his connection to Gordon or to
        Hislop’s death. And Hot Beer—described by the media as a “vio-
        lence producer . . . constantly under the police radar”—was killed
        years after his deportation, by what Gordon described as “un-
        known assailants.” More importantly, Gordon also failed to estab-
        lish that any of the Tampa distributors were killed by, with the con-
        sent of, or with the acquiescence of a Jamaican official (or that Las-
        sie was killed unlawfully by the police). Instead, the record showed
        the Jamaican government was attempting to combat corruption
        (even if mostly unsuccessfully).
              As a result, the immigration judge concluded that Gordon’s
        claim was “overly speculative” and so denied his application. The
        immigration judge acknowledged Dr. Blake’s contrary opinion but
        concluded that that opinion merited “limited weight” because it
        was based not on firsthand knowledge but primarily on Gordon’s
        version of events.
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        22-11867              Opinion of the Court                      13

               Gordon appealed to the board, which dismissed his appeal.
        The board affirmed the immigration judge’s findings that Gordon’s
        testimony, standing alone, was insufficient to meet his burden and
        that Gordon submitted insufficient corroborative evidence to sup-
        port his claims. The board noted that Gordon’s testimony lacked
        details establishing that Bulla’s organization blamed him for
        Hislop’s death—and conflicted, on this point, with Gayle’s telling
        of the car incident, which did not include a reference to “remem-
        ber[ing] Delroy’s death.” The board also observed that the immi-
        gration judge wasn’t required to accept Gordon’s subjective belief
        about the Tampa distributors’ killings, particularly when the docu-
        mentary evidence “provided other plausible motives for their
        deaths.” And the board rejected Gordon’s argument that the im-
        migration judge erred by failing to consider whether corroborating
        evidence was reasonably available, concluding that the immigra-
        tion judge didn’t deny Gordon’s application solely due to the ab-
        sence of corroborating evidence but also because the evidence Gor-
        don did present undermined his claim.
               In the alternative, the board affirmed the immigration
        judge’s denial of Gordon’s claim on the merits. The board con-
        cluded that the immigration judge reasonably found that Gordon’s
        family’s ongoing safety indicated Bulla’s organization didn’t be-
        lieve he cooperated and so wasn’t looking to harm Gordon for that
        reason. Finally, the board rejected Gordon’s claims that the immi-
        gration judge erred by ignoring credible evidence or displaying un-
        conscious bias; the board affirmed the immigration judge’s
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        14                     Opinion of the Court                22-11867

        weighing of the evidence—including the determination that only a
        chain of suppositions supported Gordon’s claim that the Jamaican
        government would consent to or acquiesce in his torture—and dis-
        cerned no bias in the record.
                              STANDARD OF REVIEW
               We review the board’s decision as the agency’s final deci-
        sion, unless the board expressly adopts the immigration judge’s
        opinion or agrees with its reasoning. Perez-Zenteno v. U.S. Att’y
        Gen., 913 F.3d 1301, 1306 (11th Cir. 2019). When (as here) the
        board adopts or agrees with the immigration judge’s reasoning, we
        review both. See id.
               We lack jurisdiction to consider issues the petitioner could
        have but failed to exhaust before the board. 8 U.S.C. § 1252(d)(1);
        Alim v. Gonzales, 446 F.3d 1239, 1253–54 (11th Cir. 2006) (applying
        section 1252(d)(1) to Convention Against Torture claim). To ex-
        haust an issue, a petitioner must both raise the “core issue” in his
        appeal to the board and “set out any discrete arguments he relies
        on in support of that claim.” Jeune v. U.S. Att’y Gen., 810 F.3d 792,
        800 (11th Cir. 2016) (citations omitted).
               Otherwise, we review de novo all legal issues. Perez-Zen-
        teno, 913 F.3d at 1306; Jeune, 810 F.3d at 799. And we review fac-
        tual determinations—including whether an applicant has estab-
        lished eligibility for relief under the Convention—under the
        “highly deferential substantial evidence test,” which “requires us to
        ‘view the record evidence in the light most favorable to the
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        22-11867                  Opinion of the Court                            15

        agency’s decision and draw all reasonable inferences in favor of that
        decision.’” Lingeswaran v. U.S. Att’y Gen., 969 F.3d 1278, 1286,
        1293–94 (11th Cir. 2020) (quoting Adefemi v. Ashcroft, 386 F.3d
        1022, 1027 (11th Cir. 2004) (en banc)). We must affirm the agency’s
        decision “if it is supported by reasonable, substantial, and probative
        evidence on the record considered as a whole.” Perez-Zenteno,
        913 F.3d at 1306 (citation omitted). “That means a finding of fact
        will be reversed ‘only when the record compels a reversal; the mere
        fact that the record may support a contrary conclusion is not
        enough . . . .’” Lopez v. U.S. Att’y Gen., 504 F.3d 1341, 1344 (11th
        Cir. 2007) (quoting Adefemi, 386 F.3d at 1027).
                                        DISCUSSION
               Gordon asserts two bases for reversal of the agency’s deci-
        sion. First, he argues that the agency erred in denying his claim for
        lack of corroboration without first finding that corroborating evi-
        dence was reasonably available. Gordon says the agency couldn’t
        “have given reasoned consideration to the corroboration issue
        without addressing the reasonableness of obtaining the ‘missing’
        corroborating evidence” or Gordon’s explanations for not produc-
        ing additional materials. Second, Gordon argues that the testi-
        mony and documentary evidence he presented were sufficient to
        meet his burden as a matter of law. 2

        2
         Gordon assumes 8 U.S.C. sections 1252(a)(2)(C) and (D) limit his appeal to
        questions of law, so he frames his arguments as errors of law. But Nasrallah
        v. Barr held these jurisdiction-stripping provisions inapplicable to judicial
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        16                        Opinion of the Court                     22-11867

               We need not reach Gordon’s first argument because, aside
        from concluding that Gordon failed to provide sufficient corrobo-
        rating evidence to meet his burden of proof, the immigration judge
        denied Gordon’s application—and the board affirmed—on an al-
        ternative ground: the evidence Gordon did present didn’t establish
        his entitlement to relief under the Convention.
                To qualify for relief under the Convention, an applicant
        must “establish that it is more likely than not that he or she would
        be tortured if removed to the proposed country of removal.”
        Reyes-Sanchez v. U.S. Att’y Gen., 369 F.3d 1239, 1242 (11th Cir.
        2004) (quoting 8 C.F.R. § 208.16(c)(2)). The torture must be “in-
        flicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquies-
        cence of a public official or other person acting in an official capac-
        ity.” Id. (quoting § 208.18(a)(1)). Acquiescence “requires that the
        public official, prior to the activity constituting torture, have
        awareness of such activity and thereafter breach his or her legal re-
        sponsibility to intervene to prevent such activity.” Id. (quoting
        § 208.18(a)(7)). A government does not acquiesce to torture where
        it attempts to combat violence or corruption, even if its attempts
        are unsuccessful. See Sanchez-Castro v. U.S. Att’y Gen., 998 F.3d
        1281, 1288 (11th Cir. 2021) (“[E]ven if Sanchez-Castro were right

        review of an order denying Convention Against Torture relief. 140 S. Ct. 1683,
        1694 (2020). We (like the government) read Gordon’s second argument as, at
        root, a factual challenge and address it as such.
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        22-11867               Opinion of the Court                       17

        that the police are not effective at controlling Mara Salvatrucha, it
        is dispositive that they are trying to do so.”).
               Substantial evidence supports the immigration judge’s find-
        ing that Gordon didn’t establish that any torture would be inflicted
        or instigated by, or occur with the consent or acquiescence of, a
        person acting in an official capacity. First, Gordon’s family has re-
        mained safe in Jamaica. Although Gordon’s mother and brother
        lived in Jamaica both throughout his involvement with Bulla’s or-
        ganization—including when Hislop was murdered, when Gordon
        was convicted of drug offenses, and when he was released early
        from prison (for snitching, to Bulla’s mind)—and since, neither was
        ever harmed by the Jamaican government (or the drug trafficking
        organization). Nor was Gayle. Although on one visit to Jamaica
        he was stopped (by unknown persons looking for Gordon), Gayle
        wasn’t harmed at that time—and he has since returned repeatedly
        to Jamaica without being harmed.
               Second, there’s substantial record evidence that the Jamai-
        can government has not tortured others associated with Bulla’s or-
        ganization. Edwin Murphy, who (unlike Gordon) did cooperate
        against the organization in exchange for early release from prison,
        now lives safely in Jamaica. Gordon admitted that Jaro Kelly
        wasn’t murdered because of his affiliation with Gordon (or Hislop’s
        death). And the news articles Gordon filed about the deaths of Hot
        Beer (who was “ambushed by a group of armed men”) and Omar
        (killed in a drive-by shooting) suggest no government involve-
        ment.
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        18                      Opinion of the Court                 22-11867

               Third, Gordon’s own expert witness, Dr. Blake, admitted
        he’d “never really heard” of Jamaican government investment in a
        drug trafficking organization like Gordon described in his testi-
        mony. Other record evidence weakens Gordon’s assertion of ties
        between the Jamaican government and Bulla’s organization too.
        Gayle was run off the road by men looking for Gordon, and Bulla
        showed up at Gordon’s father’s funeral looking for him. As the
        government suggested during Gordon’s cross-examination, the
        fact that Bulla’s organization needed to sideline Gordon’s cousin—
        or drop in on a family gathering—to determine whether he was in-
        country calls into question the organization’s relationship to cus-
        toms officials.
                Fourth, substantial record evidence supports the conclusion
        that the Jamaican government would not acquiesce to Gordon’s
        torture and is instead taking steps to combat corruption and vio-
        lence. Dr. Blake testified to internal affairs-type investigations that
        root out corruption, if only with a two percent conviction rate. His
        testimony is corroborated by numerous documentary evidence
        sources. Gordon submitted a news article quoting Dr. Horace
        Chang, Jamaica’s National Security Minister, declaring that “[w]hat
        we have to do” to combat drug dealers corrupting the legal system
        “is take steps to prevent it and mitigate the damage.” Gordon also
        filed a Jamaica Gleaner newspaper article reporting that “a number
        of independent bodies [have been] set up to investigate the po-
        lice”—including INDECOM (the Independent Commission of In-
        vestigations), to which the Jamaican constabulary force’s Anti-
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        22-11867                Opinion of the Court                        19

        Corruption Branch refers allegations of extrajudicial police shoot-
        ings. Another article reported that INDECOM investigated 125 ci-
        vilian fatalities resulting from police operations and forwarded its
        report on policy breaches to the police commissioner “to consider
        for appropriate actions.” And a news article noted $1 billion in in-
        vestment in “the new Integrity Commission” oversight body. Gor-
        don also submitted articles discussing the criminal prosecution of
        27 police officers following “an investigative commission probing
        allegations against police and soldiers” of “indiscriminate shootings
        and unlawful killings”—the articles reported a “reduction in police-
        involved killings since 2014,” perhaps because of “fear among offic-
        ers of [both] prosecution by an independent agency that now in-
        vestigates abuse allegations against police” as well as of Special Cor-
        oner’s Court inquests.
                Most importantly, Gordon also filed the U.S. Department of
        State’s 2019 and 2020 Human Rights Reports. The latter indicated
        that Jamaican law “provides criminal penalties for corruption by
        officials,” albeit ineffectively implemented. Still, the report noted
        that Jamaica’s former minister of education, youth, and infor-
        mation was charged with “several counts of corruption, conspiracy
        to defraud, and misconduct in a public office” following a scandal
        involving misuse of public funds. The State Department’s 2020 re-
        port documented two police officers convicted and imprisoned (for
        six years and life, respectively) that year for unlawful killings—and
        noted “[n]umerous other cases, particularly the Clarendon ‘Death
        Squad’ trial, await[ing] prosecution.” Not only was the agency
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        20                     Opinion of the Court                 22-11867

        entitled to “rely heavily” on these State Department reports, see
        Reyes-Sanchez, 369 F.3d at 1243, but we’ve held that a govern-
        ment’s attempts to combat violence or corruption—even if unsuc-
        cessful—are dispositive of the issue of acquiescence, Sanchez-Cas-
        tro, 998 F.3d at 1288. In short, because substantial evidence shows
        that the Jamaican government is making efforts to fight corruption,
        we must conclude as a matter of law that it would not acquiesce in
        Gordon’s torture.
                We note that Gordon presented some evidence of police in-
        volvement in the deaths of Lassie and Rankin Bernard. Gordon
        testified that Lassie was killed in a police shootout, but we’re bound
        to draw the reasonable inference in the agency’s favor that Lassie—
        described by Gordon himself as a “known thief,” “known gun-
        man,” and “troublemaker kid”—wasn’t killed unlawfully. See Lin-
        geswaran, 969 F.3d 1278 at 1286. As for Rankin Bernard, Gordon’s
        declaration indicated only that he was killed by police while vaca-
        tioning in Jamaica. With no facts suggesting otherwise, we must
        likewise infer that he wasn’t killed unlawfully.
                In sum, the record doesn’t compel a finding that Gordon will
        more likely than not be tortured by, at the instigation of, or with
        the consent or acquiescence of a government official acting in an
        official capacity. See Lopez, 504 F.3d at 1344. And “[w]hen “the
        record could support or contradict the conclusion of the [board],
        we must affirm its decision.” Lingeswaran, 969 F.3d 1278 at 1286
        (quoting Recinos v. U.S. Att’y Gen., 566 F.3d 965, 967 (11th Cir.
        2009)). Because substantial evidence supports the immigration
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        22-11867               Opinion of the Court                        21

        judge’s denial of Gordon’s claim, we lack the authority to reverse
        the board’s order affirming that decision.
                Gordon makes two final arguments, but neither is availing.
        First, he argues that the immigration judge applied an incorrect le-
        gal standard by requiring Gordon to demonstrate a particular mo-
        tivation for his likely torture, thereby adding an “extra element” to
        Gordon’s claim. We find no support in the record for this assertion;
        both the immigration judge’s decision and the board’s order ap-
        plied the correct legal standard, requiring Gordon to establish he
        would more likely than not be tortured if he returned to Jamaica.
        And to the extent the immigration judge explored the reasons be-
        hind the Tampa distributors’ deaths during the hearings, the
        agency was entitled to probe the veracity of Gordon’s claim that
        the organization wanted to harm him at all.
                Second, Gordon says the immigration judge ignored evi-
        dence of Jamaica’s history of extrajudicial killings of “social unde-
        sirables”—including drug traffickers like Gordon—and failed to ap-
        preciate the country conditions (namely, “the unique involvement
        of politics and government with organized crime and extrajudicial
        violence in Jamaica”). Gordon contends that, “[p]utting aside the
        more specific, individualized reasons why [he] faces an outsized
        risk of torture,” evidence of his “membership in the group of social
        undesirables” satisfied his burden of proof.
              We lack jurisdiction to consider this argument, however, be-
        cause Gordon did not raise it before the board. Cf. 8 U.S.C.
        § 1252(d)(1); Alim, 446 F.3d at 1253–54. In his appellate brief before
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        22                     Opinion of the Court                22-11867

        the board, Gordon raised the “core issue” that the immigration
        judge erred by finding he hadn’t shown he would more likely than
        not be tortured if removed to Jamaica, but he never raised the “dis-
        crete argument” that he would more than likely be tortured as a
        generalized “undesirable” in Jamaican society. Cf. Jeune, 810 F.3d
        at 800. Instead, Gordon argued he was “marked for death specifi-
        cally and solely because of his involvement in a criminal organiza-
        tion of which he subsequently ran afoul.” He relied entirely on the
        animosity of Bulla and his organization (with which “a wide variety
        of Jamaican officials were intimately involved”) toward Gordon be-
        cause of Hislop’s death and the perception that Gordon had
        snitched—pointing to “the systematic murder of each of his former
        Florida-based associates” and the organization’s threats to Gor-
        don’s family as among the reasons he feared facing torture in Ja-
        maica. As a result, we lack jurisdiction to consider his argument
        that he also faced torture for his “membership in the group of social
        undesirables” and so dismiss his petition in that regard.
              PETITION DISMISSED IN PART, DENIED IN PART.