Court Opinion

ID: 9404308
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-06-22 18:00:31.633155+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:20:13.045267
License: Public Domain

NOT PRECEDENTIAL

                        UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                             FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
                                 _______________

                                       No. 22-1036
                                     _______________

                          MAURICIO LLANES-QUINTEROS,
                                                Petitioner
                                      v.

               ATTORNEY GENERAL UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
                            _______________

                      On Petition for Review of a Final Order of the
                             Board of Immigration Appeals
                               (Agency No. A209-343-065)
                           Immigration Judge: David Cheng
                                    _______________
                      Submitted Under Third Circuit L.A.R. 34.1(a)
                                on November 17, 2022

                Before: AMBRO,* KRAUSE, and BIBAS, Circuit Judges

                                   (Filed: June 22, 2023)
                                     _______________

                                        OPINION**
                                     _______________

BIBAS, Circuit Judge.

     Mauricio Llanes-Quinteros, a Salvadoran native, challenges the order to remove him

from this country. Because the decisions below did not follow the proper procedure for

reviewing torture claims, we will grant in part his petition for review.

*
   Honorable Thomas L. Ambro assumed senior status on February 6, 2023.
**
   This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and, under I.O.P. 5.7, is not binding
precedent.
   In El Salvador, Quinteros was threatened and beaten by gangsters. They mocked his

Christian beliefs and demanded that he join their gang. He was also beaten by four police-

men for refusing to join the gang. So in 2016, he fled to the United States. When he arrived,

he was charged as inadmissible and put into removal proceedings. He conceded that he was

removable but sought asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the Conven-

tion Against Torture. An immigration judge denied his requests and ordered him removed,

and the Board of Immigration Appeals dismissed his appeal. He now petitions for review.

   “When the Board relies on an IJ’s legal conclusions and findings of fact, we review

[both] the IJ’s decision and the Board’s decision.” Gonzalez-Posadas v. Att’y Gen., 781

F.3d 677, 684 n.5 (3d Cir. 2015). We review factual findings for substantial evidence and

legal conclusions de novo. Yasin v. Att’y Gen., 20 F.4th 818, 822 (3d Cir. 2021).

   In seeking asylum or withholding of removal, Quinteros claimed that he was persecuted

as a member of a “particular social group”: “young El Salvadorian men whose religious

activities have exposed them to harm.” 8 U.S.C. § 1158(b)(1)(B)(i); AR 116 (capitalization

removed). On these claims, the immigration judge made both a factual finding and a legal

holding. Factually, he found that the evidence did not link Quinteros’s religion to his per-

secution: Salvadoran gangsters target all youths, and they did not focus on him because of

his faith. Legally, the judge held that the proposed group did not count under the statute.

The Board assumed that Quinteros’s proposed social group was cognizable but still dis-

missed his appeal, agreeing that he had not been targeted because of his religion.

   Quinteros denies that the immigration judge made that factual finding about the causal

nexus. But he is mistaken. The judge denied asylum “[b]ecause [his] proposed particular
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social group is not cognizable and … any harm he may have suffered was not on account

of any protected ground.” AR 75 (emphasis added).

   Substantial evidence supports this factual finding on nexus. Quinteros himself testified

that gang members harass all youths in his community. And though they mocked his

churchgoing as a waste of time, a reasonable judge could find that they persecuted him for

resisting recruitment, not for his faith. So even if his group was cognizable, he was not per-

secuted for belonging to it. Thus, he did not qualify for asylum or withholding of removal.

   As for Quinteros’s Convention Against Torture claim, our precedent requires the agency

to follow certain steps. Yet neither the judge nor the Board did so.

   A Convention claimant must satisfy a two-pronged test, showing both that (1) if he

returned home, he would be tortured, and (2) the government would acquiesce to that tor-

ture. Myrie v. Att’y Gen., 855 F.3d 509, 516–17 (3d Cir. 2017). We have made clear that

each prong has two steps. Id. For Prong 1, an immigration judge must ask: (1A) What harm

will the claimant likely suffer if he returns home? and (1B) Would that harm amount to

torture? Id. For Prong 2, the judge asks: (2A) How will public officials likely respond to

that harm? and (2B) Would that response amount to acquiescence? Id. Steps 1A and 2A are

factual questions, so the Board must review them for clear error. Id. And Steps 1B and 2B

are legal questions, so the Board must review them de novo. Id.

   Here, neither the immigration judge nor the Board followed our instructions. First, at

Step 1A, it is not clear that the immigration judge forecast what harm Quinteros would

likely face back in El Salvador. He found only (at Step 1B) that the threats previously made

by police did not amount to torture, so future torture was unlikely. Second, rather than
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separating the two steps and reviewing Step 1B de novo, the Board affirmed the whole

Prong 1 analysis as not clearly erroneous. And third, the Board did the same at Prong 2,

reviewing the whole thing for clear error rather than reviewing Step 2B de novo.

   Those procedural failures infected the agency’s decisions. Neither the immigration

judge nor the Board considered a separate death threat and beatings that Quinteros got from

gang members. In gauging the likelihood and severity of future harm, the agency should

have considered the gang’s death threat too. See Herrera-Reyes v. Att’y Gen., 952 F.3d 101,

112 n.5 (3d Cir. 2020). So we will grant the petition as to Quinteros’s Convention Against

Torture claim, vacate the Board’s order, and remand. But we will deny his petition as to

asylum and withholding of removal. We express no view on the merits.

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