Asylum denial worth reading

Abdurakhmanov v. Holder, No. 10-4263 (6th Cir. Jan. 23, 2012) (published)

The court denied this Uzbeki's asylum claim but there is some interesting language in the decision that should provide guidance for other cases.

The BIA gave three reasons in support of its adverse credibility finding.  The court rejected the first reason because it was based on a mischaracterization of the record.

The court expressed its doubts about the second reason because it seemed that the BIA read too much into the applicant's ambiguous statement in his I-589.

The court agreed with the third reason and found this sufficient to affirm the adverse credibility finding.  In this regard, there is an argument that credibility determinations are mixed questions of law and fact.  Whether there is an inconsistency or discrepancy is a factual determination that is given deference by the court.  Whether a single inconsistency means the whole case is not believable should be a question of law.  This is worth exploring in future cases.

The court went on to reject the BIA's determination that the applicant should have provided corroborating evidence.  The court rejected the rationale that the evidence provided was inconsistent with the claim because it was not.  Evidence obtained for the purpose of the hearing but were records of past events cannot be rejected on the grounds set forth in H-L-H, even though the documents were not prepared contemporaneously with the events.