NOT RECOMMENDED FOR PUBLICATION File Name: 20a0650n.06 No. 19-4109 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT FILED Nov 16, 2020 AMIR FRANCIS SHABO, ) DEBORAH S. HUNT, Clerk ) Petitioner, ) ) ON PETITION FOR REVIEW v. ) FROM THE UNITED STATES ) BOARD OF IMMIGRATION WILLIAM P. BARR, Attorney General, ) APPEALS ) Respondent. ) BEFORE: COOK, BUSH, and NALBANDIAN, Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM. Amir Francis Shabo, through counsel, petitions the court to review an order of the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) denying his motion to reopen his removal proceedings. Shabo is a native and citizen of Iraq. He came to the United States as a refugee in May 1985, and his status was adjusted to lawful permanent resident on his date of entry. In 1992, Shabo was convicted of delivery of cocaine in Michigan, and he served sixty months of imprisonment. In 1994, the Immigration and Naturalization Service served Shabo with a notice to appear, charging him with removal as a person who had been convicted of both an aggravated felony and a controlled-substance offense. In 1997, an immigration judge ordered Shabo’s removal to Iraq, and the BIA dismissed his appeal. But because Iraq was not then issuing travel documents, Shabo was not removed, and he has remained in the United States ever since. No. 19-4109, Shabo v. Barr In 2017, Shabo filed a motion with the BIA to reopen his removal proceedings and stay removal based on changed country conditions in Iraq. Seeking protection under the United Nations Convention Against Torture (CAT), Shabo claimed that he was likely to be tortured or murdered if he were removed to Iraq because persons who have lived in the United States are treated as apostates. He also claimed that, as a Chaldean Christian, he was likely to be tortured by the Islamic State (ISIS). The BIA denied Shabo’s motion to reopen, and we dismissed Shabo’s petition for review of that order based on jurisdictional grounds that the Supreme Court of the United States later abrogated. See Shabo v. Sessions, 892 F.3d 237 (6th Cir. 2018), abrogated by Nasrallah v. Barr, 140 S. Ct. 1683 (2020). In June 2019, Shabo filed a second motion to reopen with the BIA, again seeking a stay of removal under the CAT based on changed country conditions in Iraq. Shabo claimed again that, as a Chaldean Christian, he would be targeted for torture or murder by ISIS. He also said that he was likely to be tortured by the Iraqi government and government-supported militias. Shabo backed his motion with declarations by various scholars and human rights activists with knowledge of conditions in Iraq. Generally speaking, these experts opined that though ISIS has been defeated as an occupying force in Iraq, individual members and cells of ISIS remain active and commit acts of terrorism against religious minorities and persons who appear to have been “Westernized” or who appear to have some affiliation with the United States. These experts also suggested that returnees such ...
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