Case: 19-12436 Date Filed: 02/13/2020 Page: 1 of 6 [DO NOT PUBLISH] IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT ________________________ No. 19-12436 Non-Argument Calendar ________________________ Agency No. A206-801-829 GLADIS ESMERALDA CHAVEZ-DE ARTICA, Petitioner, versus U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL, Respondent. ________________________ Petition for Review of a Decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals ________________________ (February 13, 2020) Before ED CARNES, Chief Judge, MARTIN, and ROSENBAUM, Circuit Judges. PER CURIAM: Case: 19-12436 Date Filed: 02/13/2020 Page: 2 of 6 Gladis Chavez-De Artica, a citizen of El Salvador, applied for asylum and withholding of removal on the ground that she feared persecution because of her membership in a particular social group. An immigration judge denied her application and the Board of Immigration Appeals dismissed her appeal. The Board then denied her motion for reconsideration. Chavez now petitions for review of the Board’s order denying her motion for reconsideration. I. Chavez entered the United States in July 2014. The next day the Department of Homeland Security served Chavez with a notice to appear alleging that she had entered the country without being admitted or paroled and was therefore removable. Chavez conceded that she was removable, but filed an application for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the regulations implementing the Convention Against Torture. The crux of Chavez’s claim was that she feared persecution because of her membership in a particular social group — namely, her nuclear family consisting in part of herself and her oldest son. At a hearing, she testified that she had fled El Salvador because the MS-13 street gang had tried to recruit her oldest son. The gang told her son that they would harm her if he did not murder a woman for them. The immigration judge found her testimony to be credible and acknowledged that a nuclear family “may be a cognizable social group.” He found, however, that there 2 Case: 19-12436 Date Filed: 02/13/2020 Page: 3 of 6 was an insufficient nexus between her membership in the family and the persecution she faced or feared, so he denied her application.1 The Board dismissed Chavez’s appeal, finding no clear error in the immigration judge’s findings of fact and agreeing with his legal conclusions. Chavez then moved for reconsideration, contending that (1) the Board applied the wrong legal standard in assessing whether there was a nexus between her group membership and the alleged persecution, and (2) the Board erred by holding that the immigration judge did not commit clear error in finding there was no evidence of such a nexus. The Board denied Chavez’s motion, and Chavez now petitions for review of that denial. II. We review for abuse of discretion the Board’s denial of a motion to reconsider. Assa’ad v. U.S. Att’y Gen., 332 F.3d 1321, 1341 (11th Cir. 2003). The Board abuses its discretion when it makes a decision that is arbitrary or capricious. Jiang v. U.S. Att’y Gen., 568 F.3d 1252, 1256 (11th Cir. 2009). III. We first consider Chavez’s contention that the ...
Original document
Source: All recent Immigration Decisions In All the U.S. Courts of Appeals