The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit today denied a petition for review filed by a Colombian family seeking asylum and withholding of removal from the United States.
The family, led by Wilson Leonardo Canon Jimenez and his wife Angelica Parada Duarte, claimed persecution in Colombia based on their political activities and a dispute with a local criminal leader, but the court affirmed the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) decision finding insufficient evidence to meet the requirements for asylum.
The petitioners, natives and citizens of Colombia, argued they suffered persecution due to threats and violence stemming from their membership in the Colombian Liberal Party and Jimenez’s temporary work as a lawyer that brought him into conflict with a notorious narco-trafficking figure.
Background of Threats and Conflict
The family, including their two minor sons, fled Bogotá, Colombia, for the United States in December 2022. The alleged persecution began around May 2022 after Jimenez and Duarte actively campaigned for presidential candidate Federico Gutierrez, a rival of the current president, Gustavo Petro.
- Jimenez began receiving threatening phone calls once or twice a week regarding his involvement in the Liberal Party.
- In early June 2022, a colleague who also received threats was kidnapped and murdered.
- A crucial turning point occurred when Jimenez, in his capacity as a provisional lawyer, attempted to help a client in a property dispute. This led him to confront the tenant, Rafael Augusto Montanez Lancheros, also known as “Don Rafa,” whom Jimenez discovered was a leader of narco-trafficking guerrillas politically aligned with President Petro.
- Jimenez received a brochure at his factory stating, “death to snitches from Liberal Party.”
- Later, two men held Jimenez at gunpoint at his factory, accusing him of being a “snitch” for the prosecutor’s office.
- The same men later assaulted a factory employee, demanding to know the family’s whereabouts and noting they were “snitches for the police who were in politics.” They threatened to kill the family on Don Rafa’s orders.
- Days later, Jimenez witnessed a man put his arm around his younger son’s shoulder and told the boy to “run to your dad.”
Despite these incidents, the family’s attempts to seek government protection were minimal; a police patrol officer told Jimenez nothing could be done and advised him and his family to leave.
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Court’s Analysis: No Past Persecution, Weak Nexus to Politics
Writing for the panel, Circuit Judge Tymkovich upheld the BIA’s decision, focusing on three key failures in the petitioners’ case:
1. Failure to Prove Past Persecution
The court acknowledged the family’s “unfortunate circumstances” but found that the harm, even in the aggregate, did not meet the legal definition of persecution.
- Petitioners conceded they were not physically harmed and experienced no “lasting physical harm.”
- The court reiterated that “threats alone are insufficient” to constitute persecution.
- While the family endured emotional and psychological distress—Duarte reporting difficulty sleeping and a son experiencing panic attacks—the court ruled that such fears, “as physically stressful or psychologically unsettling some events may be, we have rarely, if ever, granted asylum based on threats and emotional or psychological harm alone.”
2. Lack of Nexus to Political Opinion
To qualify for asylum, the persecution must be “on account of” a protected ground, such as political opinion, which must be “at least one central reason” for the harm. The court found “substantial evidence” to support the BIA’s finding that the family was targeted primarily because of Jimenez’s actions threatening Don Rafa’s criminal enterprise and revenue.
- The court noted that threats escalated only after Jimenez got involved in the property dispute with Don Rafa.
- The men who threatened Jimenez specifically accused him of working for the prosecutor’s office and being responsible for searches and seizures at Don Rafa’s property, suggesting the predominant motive was retaliatory for Jimenez’s professional and personal involvement with Don Rafa.
- The family’s political opinion was deemed “merely tangential and subordinate to the main reason for harm.”
3. Government Protection and Internal Relocation
The court also found that the petitioners failed to demonstrate the Colombian government was “unable or unwilling to protect them.”
- The family’s efforts to seek help were “minimal, if any,” as they spoke to only two police officers and did not utilize Jimenez’s contacts within the law enforcement system (he had interned for the National Prosecutor’s office).
- Furthermore, the court concluded that even if the family had a well-founded fear of future persecution, they could “safely and reasonably relocat[e] within Colombia.” The record showed that the persecutors told them to move out of the neighborhood, not the country, and the family’s relatives remain in Colombia unharmed.
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