Court Opinion

ID: 9498778
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 17:27:49.585916+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:59:03.786068
License: Public Domain

KOZINSK3, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
We have never before held that anonymous death threats, without a scintilla of corroborating harassment, compel a finding that an asylum seeker’s fear of persecution is well founded, and I cannot join the majority in interfering, yet again, with the ability of Immigration Judges to do their jobs. Petitioner doesn’t allege she endured any harassment other than anonymous threats — not beatings, not detention, not face-to-face confrontation — to support her claim that she will be persecuted if she returns to Peru. The majority nevertheless holds not merely that a reasonable factfin-der could have determined that Canales-Vargas has a well-founded fear of future persecution, but that a reasonable factfin-der would be required to so find. See INS v. Elias-Zacarias, 502 U.S. 478, 481 & n. 1, 112 S.Ct. 812, 117 L.Ed.2d 38 (1992). This conclusion contravenes both Supreme Court and circuit precedent requiring deference to the administrative agency.
The majority concedes, as it must, that the handful of anonymous threats petitioner received doesn’t amount to past persecution. See maj. at 744. So our cases holding that “death threats alone can constitute persecution,” Navas v. INS, 217 F.3d 646, 658 (9th Cir.2000), are entirely beside the point. Navas stands for the unremarkable proposition that the harm inflicted by living under threat of death can sometimes be severe enough to constitute persecution. The majority thus correctly notes that “[t]he fact that [petitioner] did not suffer physical harm is not determinative of her claim of persecution.” Maj. at 746 (second alteration in original) (quoting Kahssai v. INS, 16 F.3d 323, 329 (9th Cir.1994) (per curiam) (Reinhardt, J., concurring)). And it cites other cases stating that death threats alone can constitute persecution. See, e.g., Khup v. Ashcroft, 376 F.3d 898, 903 (9th Cir.2004); Rios v. Ashcroft, 287 F.3d 895, 900 (9th Cir.2002). But all of these authorities are irrelevant once the majority holds, as it must, that petitioner hasn’t been persecuted.
*748The only remaining question is whether petitioner, who was not persecuted in the past, nevertheless has a well-founded fear of future persecution. Since the IJ found that she had no well-founded fear, our role is a limited one: to examine the record and decide whether it compels the conclusion that the IJ erred in this regard. See Elias-Zacarias, 502 U.S. at 481, 112 S.Ct. 812. And what does the record show? Over fifteen years ago, petitioner spoke out against the Shining Path in a five-to-ten minute speech before a crowd of 250 people. A few weeks later, an anonymous letter appeared under her door, warning her to keep her mouth shut. Over the next seven months, the harassment escalated — four or five more letters followed, along with a number of threatening telephone calls. The most menacing threatened to place a bomb in petitioner’s home and kill her family. The letters and callers never claimed to be associated with the Shining Path, so petitioner can’t be sure who made the threats.1 Throughout that period, the threats never materialized— petitioner was never injured in any way, or even confronted face to face, before she left for the United States.
The Immigration Judge (IJ) carefully considered this evidence, and rendered a thoughtful and well-reasoned opinion.2 The IJ gave two reasons that petitioner’s fear of future persecution was not well founded: First, during the seven months that she remained in Peru, “[cjertainly, the Shining Path could have reached her and punished her if they thought that’s what they wanted, for her failure to leave promptly. They did not do anything.” Second, “it is quite remote and quite unlikely that, given the fact that she has been away from Peru for approximately six years, actually, more than six years, that the Shining Path would be interested in her at this point in time.”
The majority rejects the IJ’s reasons, and holds that “[tjhese threats, made by a recognized terrorist organization, create at least a one-in-ten chance that Canales-Vargas would be severely harmed — if not, killed — if the Shining Path discovered that she had returned to Peru.” Maj. at 745. The majority’s opinion can only be read to announce a per se rule that any death threat from a group capable of carrying through on it requires a finding that the petitioner’s fear of persecution is well founded. The majority’s only authority for this dubious proposition is Sael v. Ashcroft, 386 F.3d 922, 925 (9th Cir.2004), which said nothing of the sort. Sael endured a lot more than threats to cause her to fear persecution: Her car tires were slashed, her house was stoned, and a mob attempted to break into her house. See id. at 927.
We have never held that anonymous threats, without more, compel a finding that a fear is well founded. We have always required the petitioner to demonstrate some corroborating facts in addition to the threats to show that the threats should be taken seriously. For example, in Marcos v. Gonzales, 410 F.3d 1112 (9th Cir.2005), the petitioner joined a network of amateur radio operators who reported guerilla group activity to the Philippine Army. Id. at 1115-16. For several years, *749he received ten death threats a month over the radio, and telephone death threats three to five times daily at his house. Id. at 1116. In addition, guerillas confronted him in person and repeated the threats both at his house and at his office. Id. The police took these threats seriously enough to provide him special protection at work. Id. And in other threat cases, the threats were also backed up by in-person confrontation, or worse. See, e.g., Kaiser v. Ashcroft, 390 F.3d 653, 658 (9th Cir. 2004) (family members followed by death squad); Siong v. INS, 376 F.3d 1030, 1039 (9th Cir.2004) (attacks on four friends).
Had the majority analyzed the facts of Canales-Vargas’s case under our caselaw, it would have been compelled to affirm for the two reasons the IJ gave. First, the IJ noted that “if the Shining Path really intended to harm her or her family, they had plenty of time to do that.” As the majority emphasizes, when the Shining Path wants to persecute political opponents, it is ruthlessly efficient at doing so. See maj. at 745 n.5. But by petitioner’s own testimony, we know that the rebels knew who she was and where she lived, yet they never bothered to confront her directly, much less attempt to act on their threats.
The majority nevertheless rejects the IJ’s reasoning, noting that the threats increased in severity over time and that petitioner left Peru promptly after the last one. Neither observation undermines the IJ’s reasoning. The majority also cites two cases, Gonzalez v. INS, 82 F.3d 903, 909 (9th Cir.1996), and Damaize-Job v. INS, 787 F.2d 1332, 1336 (9th Cir.1986), for the proposition that a quiet period during which the persecutors don’t act on their threats isn’t determinative. It’s true that the fact “that none of the threats against Petitioners have yet to be carried out does not render their fear unreasonable.” Kaiser, 390 F.3d at 658. Otherwise, death threats could never support a future persecution finding. “What matters is whether the group making the threat has the will or the ability to carry it out.” Bolanos-Hernandez v. INS, 767 F.2d 1277, 1285 (9th Cir.1985). Under Lim v. INS, 224 F.3d 929 (9th Cir.2000), a period where rebels don’t make good on their threats is “relevant,” see id. at 935, because a lengthy period without harm suggests that the terrorists didn’t have the will to carry through with their threats.
In the two cases that the majority cites, there wasn’t any doubt that the government was willing to make good on its threats: In Damaize-Job, the government threatened petitioner with death after imprisoning and torturing him for three months. Petitioner’s uncle and sister had disappeared, likely murdered by the government. See Damaize-Job, 787 F.2d at 1334. Likewise, in Gonzalez, government soldiers personally threatened the petitioner, and her family members were imprisoned and beaten. See Gonzalez, 82 F.3d at 906. But Canales-Vargas can’t point to anything in the record, much less physical violence, corroborating willingness and ability to carry out the threats.
This is reason enough to deny the petition, but the IJ gave us more: The threats in this case are almost fifteen years old. The older threats get, the more likely it is that the persecutors have moved on to other targets. For example, in Prasad v. INS, 47 F.3d 336 (9th Cir.1995), we found the petitioner’s fear of persecution wasn’t well founded in part because there was no evidence that the government had any continuing interest in him. Id. at 339; see also Useinovic v. INS, 313 F.3d 1025, 1032-33 (7th Cir.2002) (noting that petitioner “did not suffer severe consequences for his actions at the time he acted, and the passage of time since these activities only lessened the likelihood he would face *750any persecution”). Nor is there any evidence that, as in other Shining Path cases, see, e.g., Gonzales-Neyra v. INS, 122 F.3d 1293, 1295 (9th Cir.1997), the guerillas have attempted to keep track of petitioner’s whereabouts after she left Peru.
The majority concedes that “the age of the threats that Canales-Vargas received are relevant to our evaluation of the reasonableness of Canales-Vargas’ fear.” Maj. at 746. And then it concedes that the age of the threats may bring the likelihood that Canales-Vargas will be persecuted below fifty percent. Id. But it can’t quite bring itself to admit that the age of the threats would allow a reasonable IJ to conclude that the likelihood of future persecution is below ten percent. The majority doesn’t explain why not. Instead, it cites to Cardenas v. INS, 294 F.3d 1062, 1064, 1067 (9th Cir.2002), where we found a well-founded fear based on threats from the Shining Path that were nine years old. But in Cardenas,, the Shining Path suspected the petitioner of informing the government about its activities, in part because his brother was a policeman. The Shining Path responded by painting threats in public view on Cardenas’s house. The petitioner, scared for his life, agreed to help the Shining Path smuggle supplies, but he reneged on the deal. Shining Path members were angry enough to track him and his family throughout the country, threatening them again after they moved from their hometown in Lima to a smaller town, and still again when they returned to Lima six months later. We concluded that the Shining Path’s interest in Cardenas was so strong that it was unlikely to have waned over time. There’s nothing like that here — no public threats, no anger at broken deals, no stalking in another Peruvian city. It wasn’t unreasonable for the IJ to look at the evidence and conclude that lo these many years later, the Shining Path is likely to have moved on to other targets.
When we review an IJ’s findings, our job is to examine the facts in light of the IJ’s reasoning and determine whether it is supported’ by substantial evidence. The majority has substituted its own judgment for the IJ’s, and announced that ancient death threats compel a finding that a petitioner’s fear of persecution is well founded today. This approach finds no support in our caselaw. The IJ closely reviewed the record, and gave reasons for his decision that are supported by substantial evidence. We must deny the petition.

. Petitioner claims in her opening brief that she was shot four times by Shining Path terrorists in Peru and that she identified her assailant. Were these claims true, this would be a very different case. But as the government noted in its brief, these facts are nowhere to be found in the record, and probably come from a different case entirely.

. Although he expressed some doubt as to petitioner's credibility, he made no express adverse credibility finding, so we accept her testimony as true. See Kalubi v. Ashcroft, 364 F.3d 1134, 1137-38 (9th Cir.2004).