NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS NOV 3 2021 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT RICARDO ACUNA-MUNOZ, No. 20-72032 Petitioner, Agency No. A206-354-109 v. MEMORANDUM* MERRICK B. GARLAND, Attorney General, Respondent. On Petition for Review of an Order of the Board of Immigration Appeals Submitted October 8, 2021** Seattle, Washington Before: PAEZ, M. SMITH, and NGUYEN, Circuit Judges. Petitioner Ricardo Acuna-Munoz, a native and citizen of Mexico, petitions for review of a decision by the Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”) affirming the denial by an immigration judge (“IJ”) of his application for withholding of * This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3. ** The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2). removal and protection under the Convention Against Torture (“CAT”).1 Acuna- Munoz sought immigration relief based on alleged threats by members of the La Pesada and La Granja gangs and their collusion with law enforcement. 1. Acuna-Munoz’s brief before the BIA did not develop any argument about why the IJ erred in denying his withholding claim. Because Acuna-Munoz failed to exhaust administrative remedies, we lack jurisdiction to review the IJ’s withholding decision. See 8 U.S.C. § 1252(d)(1); Barron v. Ashcroft, 358 F.3d 674, 678 (9th Cir. 2004) (“[Section] 1252(d)(1) mandates exhaustion and therefore generally bars us, for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, from reaching the merits of a legal claim not presented in administrative proceedings below.”); see also Abebe v. Mukasey, 554 F.3d 1203, 1208 (9th Cir. 2009) (“Petitioner will therefore be deemed to have exhausted only those issues he raised and argued in his brief before the BIA.”). Accordingly, the petition is dismissed as to Acuna-Munoz’s challenge to the IJ’s denial of withholding of removal. 2. We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252 to review Acuna-Munoz’s challenge to the IJ’s denial of his CAT claim. We review for substantial evidence. See Yali Wang v. Sessions, 861 F.3d 1003, 1007 (9th Cir. 2017). In denying Acuna-Munoz’s CAT claim, the IJ found that his testimony 1 Acuna-Munoz did not contest before the BIA, and does not argue in this appeal, that the IJ erred in granting the government’s motion to pretermit his asylum claim. 2 about encounters with law enforcement was not credible. Acuna-Munoz argues that this finding was in error. We disagree. In support of his application for relief, Acuna-Munoz provided an affidavit that stretched over 29 single-spaced pages. That affidavit mentioned only a single encounter with law enforcement, an alleged detention and beating by officers from PGR, which is a unit of Mexico’s federal government. At his hearing, however, Acuna-Munoz testified that he was not detained by the PGR but was instead detained by local police. Substantial evidence supported the IJ’s conclusion that these inconsistencies undermined the credibility of Acuna-Munoz’s testimony about his encounters with law enforcement. See Manes v. Sessions, 875 F.3d 1261, 1264 (9th Cir. …
Original document
Source: All recent Immigration Decisions In All the U.S. Courts of Appeals