Case: 21-60391 Document: 00516787823 Page: 1 Date Filed: 06/15/2023 United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit FILED June 15, 2023 No. 21-60391 Lyle W. Cayce Clerk Jose Luis Medina Carreon, Petitioner, versus Merrick Garland, U.S. Attorney General, Respondent. Petition for Review of an Order of the Board of Immigration Appeals BIA No. A200 224 818 Before Wiener, Higginson, and Wilson, Circuit Judges. Cory T. Wilson, Circuit Judge: Jose Luis Medina Carreon, a native and citizen of Mexico, petitions for review of a decision by the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) dismissing his appeal from the denial of his application for cancellation of removal. He challenges the BIA decision on grounds that: (1) it was ultra vires because the order was signed by a temporary BIA member whose term had expired; (2) the BIA erred in finding that Medina Carreon lacked good moral character; and (3) the BIA erred in affirming the denial of voluntary departure. We lack jurisdiction to consider some of Medina Carreon’s Case: 21-60391 Document: 00516787823 Page: 2 Date Filed: 06/15/2023 No. 21-60391 arguments, and where we have jurisdiction, his arguments fail. Accordingly, we dismiss his petition in part and deny it in part. I. Medina Carreon entered the United States in 1996 without being admitted or paroled. In 2011, while serving a sentence for three misdemeanor convictions arising out of an illegal cockfighting ring, 1 he was served with a notice to appear for removal proceedings. At a hearing in March 2013, Medina Carreon conceded removability and filed an application for cancellation of removal. At a September 2018 hearing concerning his application, he testified that he did not know cockfighting was illegal in Texas, as it commonly occurs in Mexico. Following that hearing, the Immigration Judge (IJ) determined that Medina Carreon was ineligible for cancellation of removal because he lacked good moral character under 8 U.S.C. § 1101(f)’s “catchall” provision.2 The IJ weighed facts bearing on Medina Carreon’s character as either positive or negative. As positives, the IJ considered Medina Carreon’s family, his long residence in the United States, his “enduring marriage,” his employment record, his assets, and character testimony that he was “a hard, good worker, and a good family man and neighbor.” As negatives, the IJ considered 1 Medina Carreon was arrested while attending a cockfight in Grayson County, Texas. Subsequently, he was convicted of attempt to commit cruelty to livestock animals, keeping a gambling place, and gambling promotion. For these crimes, he was sentenced to 180 days in prison but only served five months. 2 Section 1101(f) provides a multi-part definition for whether an alien may be regarded as a person of good moral character. The definition first prohibits such a finding for aliens falling into certain per se classes. See 8 U.S.C. § 1101(f)(1)–(9). It ends with a “catchall” provision, which states that “[t]he fact that any person is not within any of the foregoing classes shall not preclude a finding that for other …
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