Rodriguez Dominguez v. Bondi

NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS APR 8 2026 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT MARICELA ELIZABETH RODRIGUEZ No. 24-3113 DOMINGUEZ; KIMBERLY MICHELLE Agency Nos. MORAN RODRIGUEZ; CHRISS A209-162-005 ENRIQUE MORAN RODRIGUEZ, A209-162-006 A209-162-007 Petitioners, v. MEMORANDUM* PAMELA BONDI, Attorney General, Respondent.

On Petition for Review of an Order of the Board of Immigration Appeals Submitted April 8, 2026** San Francisco, California Before: NGUYEN, MILLER, and COLLINS, Circuit Judges.

Maricela Elizabeth Rodriguez Dominguez and her two minor children, natives and citizens of El Salvador, petition for review of a decision of the Board

* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3. ** The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2). of Immigration Appeals dismissing their appeal from an order of an immigration judge denying their applications for asylum, withholding of removal, and protection under the Convention Against Torture (CAT). We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252, and we deny the petition.

Where, as here, the Board agrees with the immigration judge’s reasoning and adds some of its own, we review the Board’s decision and those parts of the immigration judge’s decision upon which it relied. Sharma v. Garland, 9 F.4th 1052, 1059 (9th Cir. 2021). We review the Board’s factual findings for substantial evidence. Rodriguez-Zuniga v. Garland, 69 F.4th 1012, 1016 (9th Cir. 2023).

Under that deferential standard, the agency’s findings of fact are “conclusive unless any reasonable adjudicator would be compelled to conclude to the contrary.” 8 U.S.C. § 1252(b)(4)(B).

1. Substantial evidence supports the Board’s determination that Rodriguez Dominguez did not establish the required nexus between any past harm or feared future harm and a statutorily protected ground. Rodriguez-Zuniga, 69 F.4th at 1016. Rodriguez Dominguez testified that gang members had been extorting her partner because he “had a job” and they “thought he had money,” and that the gang members demanded that she continue to make payments after he fled. She contends that the gang members’ subsequent targeting of her established that she

2 24-3113 was harmed on account of her membership in a particular social group: the “immediate family members of [her partner].”

But an “alien’s desire to be free from harassment by criminals motivated by theft or random violence by gang members bears no nexus to a protected ground.”

Zetino v. Holder, 622 F.3d 1007, 1016 (9th Cir. 2010). We have explained that evidence “that the persecutor’s actual motivation for threatening a person is to extort money from a third person” generally “does not compel finding that the persecutor threatened the target because of a protected characteristic such as family relation.” Rodriguez-Zuniga, 69 F.4th at 1019. Because the record contains no evidence that the gang members harbored any animus towards Rodriguez Dominguez’s family and instead shows they had only “economic motivations,” she failed to show that a statutorily protected ground was either “a reason” or “one central reason” for any past harm or feared future harm. Id. at 1022–23. Therefore, her asylum and withholding claims fail. Id. at 1023.

2. Substantial evidence supports the agency’s denial of CAT relief. To obtain CAT relief, a petitioner must establish that “it is more likely than not that he or she would be tortured if removed,” 8 C.F.R. § 1208.16(c)(2), and that the torture would be “inflicted by, or at the instigation of, or with the consent or acquiescence of, a public official” or other person acting in an official capacity, id. § 1208.18(a)(1). As the immigration judge pointed out, Rodriguez Dominguez’s

3 24-3113 family members, including her partner’s father, continue to reside in El Salvador, and the record does not indicate they have been harmed or threatened by the gang members. Thus, the record does not compel the conclusion that Rodriguez Dominguez would face a “particularized and non-speculative risk of torture” if she were removed. Park v. Garland, 72 F.4th 965, 980 (9th Cir. 2023) (emphasis omitted); see Delgado-Ortiz v. Holder, 600 F.3d 1148, 1152 (9th Cir. 2010) (holding that “generalized evidence of violence and crime” is insufficient to establish a likelihood of future torture).

The motion to stay removal (Dkt. No. 2) is denied.

PETITION DENIED.

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