Summary
This Seventh Circuit opinion reviews the Board of Immigration Appeals' denial of asylum, humanitarian asylum, withholding of removal, and Convention Against Torture relief for a Guatemalan national. The court denies the petition for review, finding that the petitioner waived her challenge to the government's inability to protect her and that substantial evidence supports the lower tribunal's conclusion that her harm stemmed from personal animosity rather than a protected ground. Additionally, the court dismisses her CAT claim due to failure to exhaust administrative remedies.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether Mateo-Mateo's asylum, humanitarian-asylum, and withholding-of-removal claims could succeed when she did not challenge the agency's independent finding that the Guatemalan government was not unable or unwilling to protect her.
- Whether substantial evidence supported the agency's finding that Mateo-Mateo was not harmed on account of a protected ground.
- Whether Mateo-Mateo exhausted administrative remedies for her CAT claim by challenging neither the Board's waiver finding nor the merits of the CAT claim before the Board.
Holdings
- The petition for review of the asylum, humanitarian-asylum, and withholding-of-removal claims must be denied because Mateo-Mateo failed to challenge the agency's independent and dispositive finding that the Guatemalan government was not unable or unwilling to protect her.
- Substantial evidence supported the Immigration Judge's and Board's finding that personal animosity, rather than Mateo-Mateo's membership in a protected social group, motivated Lucinda Juarez's abuse.
- Mateo-Mateo failed to exhaust administrative remedies for her CAT claim because she did not challenge the Board's finding that the claim was waived and had not presented her CAT arguments to the Board.
Key quotations
“We deny the petition for review.” (124 F.4th at 470)
“Mateo’s final claim for CAT relief fails on exhaustion grounds.” (124 F.4th at 470)
Factual background
Mateo-Mateo, a Guatemalan citizen, was physically and verbally abused by Lucinda Juarez, the mother of the father of Mateo-Mateo's children. The abuse included threats, frequent beatings, and assaults intended to cause a miscarriage; it ended after Mateo-Mateo moved out of Juarez's home, although verbal abuse and later threats continued. Mateo-Mateo eventually left Guatemala with her children and sought asylum-based and CAT relief in the United States.
Procedural history
After Mateo-Mateo and her children were placed in removal proceedings, they conceded removability. Mateo-Mateo applied for asylum, withholding of removal, and CAT relief, naming her children as derivative asylum applicants. The Immigration Judge denied all requested relief; the Board of Immigration Appeals affirmed, finding no clear error regarding the absence of a nexus to a protected ground and the government's ability or willingness to protect her, and deeming the CAT claim waived. The Seventh Circuit denied the petition for review.