Niz-Chavez v. Barr

Opinion

 [*525]  COLE, Chief Judge. Agusto Niz-Chavez, a Guatemalan native and citizen, arrived in the United States without inspection in 2005. Immigration proceedings concerning Niz-Chavez commenced in 2013. Niz-Chavez applied for withholding of removal under the Immigration and Nationality Act and for relief under the Convention Against Torture. After the immigration judge ("IJ") denied those applications, Niz-Chavez appealed the IJ's decision to the Board of Immigration Appeals ("BIA") and asked the BIA to remand the case to the IJ to consider Niz-Chavez's application for cancellation of removal in light of the Supreme Court's decision in Pereira v. Sessions, 138 S. Ct. 2105, 201 L. Ed. 2d 433 (2018). The BIA denied Niz-Chavez's motion to remand and affirmed the IJ's determination that Niz-Chavez was not entitled to withholding of removal or relief under [**2]  the Convention Against Torture. Niz-Chavez then appealed.

For the reasons stated below, we deny Niz-Chavez's petition for review of each of the challenged BIA decisions.

I. BACKGROUND

A. Factual Background

Niz-Chavez was born in Tajumulco, San Marcos, Guatemala in 1990. Prior to his arrival in the United States, he lived in Tajumulco with his family. He is the sixth of eight children in his family. Niz-Chavez and his family lived together on land that they owned without issue until around 2002. Around that time, a land dispute arose between Niz-Chavez's family and villagers from Ixchiguan, a neighboring village.

Niz-Chavez testified that Ixchiguan villagers murdered his brother-in-law during this dispute. Two years later, the dispute escalated again when fifty armed Ixchiguan villagers arrived at the land and took possession of the land by threatening Niz-Chavez's family, advising them that "if they found a member of [his] family [on the land], they were going to kill him or her." (September 13, 2017 Hearing Transcript, A.R. 197.) His family has not returned to the disputed land, and his parents now live on a piece of land about an hour from the land that the Ixchiguan villagers forcibly [**3]  took. Some of Niz-Chavez's siblings also remain in Guatemala. Niz-Chavez testified that his family still receives threats from the Ixchiguan villagers, but he is not aware of any further acts of violence attempted or carried out against his family.

Niz-Chavez left Guatemala and arrived in the United States in 2005. After residing in Harrison, Virginia, for two years, Niz-Chavez moved to Detroit, Michigan, in 2007, where he has lived ever since. He is now the father of three children, who are United States citizens. Regarding a potential return to Guatemala, Niz-Chavez testified that he was concerned that the Ixchiguan villagers would learn of his return and, believing that he was in the country to reclaim the stolen land, kidnap or kill him. He also expressed concern that the village of Tajumulco would force him to fight in a land war against the Ixchiguan villagers.

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