Robinson Juarez-Vicente v. Merrick Garland, No. 22-3318 (8th Cir. 2023)
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Petitioner is a citizen of Guatemala. He says that from elementary school through adulthood, his classmates and coworkers touched his “private parts” and subjected him to homophobic slurs because he is bisexual. He left university because of verbal abuse, and he quit his job at a restaurant after his coworkers harassed him. But he testified that he never suffered a physical injury, and he never reported the harassment to the police or to authorities at his school or workplace. After his friend was murdered, Petitioner left for the United States. He was detained at the U.S. border after he entered without inspection. He applied for asylum, withholding of removal, and protections under the Convention Against Torture. An immigration judge (IJ) denied his application, and he appealed to the BIA. The BIA dismissed his appeal. Petitioner petitioned for review of the denial of his application for asylum.
The Eighth Circuit denied the petition, holding that substantial evidence supported the BIA’s determination. The court explained that Petitioner cited evidence of impunity for crimes against transgender women and alleged that police regularly extort and harass male and transgender sex workers. But as the BIA reasoned, he is neither a transgender woman nor a sex worker. He also testified that a gay man was once beheaded when Petitioner was a child. But there is no record evidence that gay men are regularly killed in Guatemala such that there is a pattern or practice of it. So a reasonable fact-finder could adopt the BIA’s implicit position that Petitioner did not show a pattern or practice of persecution.
Court Description: [Kobes, Author, with Colloton and Grasz, Circuit Judges] Petition for Review - Immigration. The agency did not err in determining that the repeated sexual harassment petitioner suffered in Guatemala did not rise to the level of past persecution for the purposes of determining whether he was eligible for asylum; nor did the agency err in its conclusion that petitioner had not shown a pattern or practice of persecution which would establish a well-founded fear of future persecution.
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