CA1: El Salvador petition flushed with “sympathy”

Flores-Coreas v. Mukasey, No. 07-1638 (2/1/08) (unpublished).  In the US, the government loves to say how it hates gangs from El Salvador.  But if someone from El Salvador sneaks into the US, and seeks asylum because of what the gangs did to him, they are not eligible for asylum.  In fact, the IJ will say that the threats are not severe enough.  The First says that the evidence presented that he was harassed because 1) he is a member of a certain church; or 2) he was “persecuted” because of his political refusal to join a gang is was based on “weak circumstantial evidence.”  In fact, the First makes it clear: his petition is doomed because he was merely targeted out of greed!

Then, the First tells everyone that it really cares and we shouldn’t think that they are letting IJs go on a power-trip against people from poor countries.  “We are not without empathy for the petitioner's plight.  Gang violence apparently is endemic in El Salvador, and the events described by the petitioner paint an unattractive picture. But the substantial evidence rule demands that we uphold the agency's determination unless the evidence ‘points unerringly in the opposite direction.’”    After reading these words I am completely convinced, the First is being really intellectual and sympathetic.  Even though it is a per curiam decision, it includes the word “tenebrous” so I assume that Selya got his clerks to look up a new word, so that the petitioner can say it when gangs beat him up for leaving the country.