Edgar G.C., a native and citizen of Mexico, entered the United States as a child and has lived here since. During his childhood, he suffered severe physical, emotional, and sexual abuse at the hands of his father, a member of the Los Zetas cartel. After his father was deported to Mexico in 2012, G.C. remained in the U.S. but was later convicted of petty theft and felony assault in 2018. Following his convictions, the Department of Homeland Security initiated removal proceedings. G.C. applied for asylum, withholding of removal, and Convention Against Torture (CAT) relief, arguing that his father and the Los Zetas cartel would torture him if he returned to Mexico. The Immigration Judge and the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) denied all claims, finding his assault conviction a particularly serious crime and concluding that the evidence did not establish a greater than 50% likelihood of future torture.
The panel addressed two primary issues. First, regarding withholding of removal, the court applied the abuse of discretion standard to the BIA's determination that G.C.'s assault conviction was a particularly serious crime. The court found that the agency properly considered the nature of the offense, the sentence imposed, and the underlying facts, including G.C.'s mental health conditions. The court rejected G.C.'s argument that the agency failed to consider his specific mental health diagnoses, noting that the agency considered the evidence of his mental illness but reasonably concluded it did not mitigate his dangerousness, particularly given his violent reaction to verbal provocation. Second, regarding CAT relief, the court addressed whether evidence of past abuse in the United States could be considered. The court held that the regulatory definition of 'torture' requires acquiescence by a public official of the country of removal. Therefore, abuse occurring in the U.S. cannot constitute 'past torture' under CAT because the Mexican government could not have acquiesced to it. The court further found that substantial evidence supported the BIA's factual finding that G.C. was not more likely than not to be tortured. The court relied on the passage of time, the history of unfulfilled death threats, and the lack of clarity regarding the father's current motives to conclude that the record did not compel a different result. The court explicitly rejected the dissent's approach as an impermissible re-weighing of evidence.
The decision leaves G.C.'s removal order intact. It clarifies that evidence of past abuse in the United States does not automatically qualify as 'past torture' for CAT claims because the definition requires government acquiescence in the country of removal. The ruling reinforces the high deference given to agency fact-finding in CAT cases, requiring that the record compel a conclusion contrary to the agency's finding for a court to reverse. The case is remanded with instructions to deny the petition.
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