## Facts

- Adela Hernandez-Ortiz, a native and citizen of El Salvador, entered the United States without inspection in September 1977.
- An immigration judge found her deportable in August 1980, and the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) dismissed her appeal in 1982.
- She filed a petition for review that automatically stayed deportation, but the INS erroneously deported her to El Salvador while the stay was in effect.
- The United States arranged and paid for her return; she reentered the United States in November 1982 after being delayed by Salvadoran officials who required a payment to permit departure.
- After returning, she sought asylum and withholding of deportation and moved to reopen before the BIA to apply for relief under 8 U.S.C. § 1158(a) and 8 U.S.C. § 1253(h).
- In support of reopening, she submitted an affidavit and materials alleging: Salvadoran security forces killed her brother and sister-in-law; security forces robbed her grandparents’ store; security forces kidnapped and threatened other close relatives; and authorities viewed her as a “traitor” because she returned to the United States with U.S. government assistance.
- She also submitted country conditions evidence describing widespread political violence and abuses by security forces in El Salvador.
- The BIA denied reopening, treating her showing as fear of generalized violence rather than individualized persecution tied to a protected ground.

## Issues

1. Whether the BIA abused its discretion by denying reopening to permit an asylum application on the ground that Hernandez-Ortiz failed to make a prima facie showing of a well-founded fear of persecution.
2. Whether the BIA abused its discretion by denying reopening where the evidence, taken as true, made a prima facie showing for withholding of deportation based on a clear probability of persecution.

## Decision

- The Ninth Circuit granted the petition for review, reversed the BIA’s denial of the motion to reopen, and remanded.
- The court held that Hernandez-Ortiz’s submissions established a prima facie case for both asylum and withholding of deportation.
- The court concluded the BIA abused its discretion by mischaracterizing the evidence as mere “random violence” and by applying an overly demanding standard at the reopening stage.

## Legal Principles

- A motion to reopen may be denied in the agency’s discretion, but that discretion is constrained by governing legal standards; denial is reversible for abuse of discretion.
- At the reopening stage, the applicant need only present evidence that, if taken as true, would establish a prima facie entitlement to relief; the applicant need not conclusively prove the claim.
- Asylum requires a prima facie showing of a well-founded fear of persecution on account of a protected ground; withholding requires a prima facie showing of a clear probability of persecution, a higher standard.
- Harm occurring amid civil strife is not automatically “generalized violence”; targeted killings, kidnappings, threats, or official suspicion directed at the applicant or close family may support an inference of persecution on account of actual or imputed political opinion.
- Country conditions evidence can corroborate an applicant’s account and support an inference that security-force violence is politically motivated rather than random or purely criminal.

## Conclusion

The Ninth Circuit required reopening because Hernandez-Ortiz’s specific allegations of security-force violence against her family, combined with her claimed targeting as a perceived traitor and corroborating country conditions, met the prima facie threshold for asylum and withholding, making the BIA’s contrary denial an abuse of discretion.


Hernandez-Ortiz v. Immigr. & Naturalization Serv., 777 F.2d 509 (9th Cir. 1985)