Karine Chrakyan; Lusine Shahinyan v. ERIC H. HOLDER, Jr., Attorney General

* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
KARINE CHRAKYAN; LUSINE
SHAHINYAN,
Petitioners,
v.
ERIC H. HOLDER, Jr., Attorney General,
Respondent.
No. 08-70759
Agency Nos. A079-544-227
A079-544-228
MEMORANDUM*
On Petition for Review of an Order of the
Board of Immigration Appeals
Argued and Submitted November 17, 2011
San Francisco, California
Before: THOMAS, GOULD, and BYBEE, Circuit Judges.
Petitioners Karine Chrakyan and her daughter, Lusine Shahinyan, a
derivative applicant, (together, “Petitioners”) both natives and citizens of Russia,
petition for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (“BIA”) decision
affirming an Immigration Judge’s (“IJ”) denial of her applications for asylum,
FILED
DEC 02 2011
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS

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1 Because Petitioner’s testimony was found to be credible, we present the events
according to her testimony.
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withholding of removal, and protection under the Convention Against Torture
(“CAT”).
Petitioners, both Chechens, entered the United States to escape the conflict
between Chechnya and Russia. 1 During the war, they were displaced to a refugee
camp where in one instance Russian soldiers, who were drunk and under the
influence of drugs at the time, demanded their valuables and, when they had none
to give, tore their clothes and beat them. Petitioners suffered no broken bones, and
the record does not show they required medical treatment, but, per Petitioner’s
testimony which we must credit, they were badly beaten.
Petitioners moved to Moscow but, because they were Chechen, could not get
a registration stamp to live in the city. Police stopped them and took them to the
police station, where, according to Petitioner Karine, police would “humiliate us,
harass us, scare, frighten us that they would send us back to refugee camps” until
the Chrakyans gave them money as a bribe to leave the police station.
The BIA held that Petitioners did not demonstrate that the beating and
harassment they suffered at the refugee camp rose to the level of past persecution,
and the discrimination they described in other parts of Russia also did not show

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past persecution. We review that determination for substantial evidence. See
Kumar v. Gonzales, 444 F.3d 1043, 1049 (9th Cir. 2006). “Reversal is warranted
only if the evidence presented was such that a reasonable fact-finder would be
compelled to conclude that the petitioner was persecuted . . . .” Padash v. INS, 358
F.3d 1161, 1165 (9th Cir. 2004). The record does not compel a finding of past
persecution. There is nothing to suggest that the incident at the refugee camp was
anything more than a robbery or that Petitioners were targeted by the soldiers
because of a protected ground. Also, the harassment that petitioner described in
Moscow did not rise to the level of persecution. See Gu v. Gonzales, 454 F.3d
1014 (9th Cir. 2006) (past persecution not found where petitioner was detained at a
police station for three days and beaten ten times with a rod).
Petitioners have also not met their burden of establishing that they are “more
likely than not to suffer intentionally-inflicted cruel and inhuman treatment that
either (1) is not lawfully sanctioned by that country or (2) is lawfully sanctioned by
that country, but defeats the object and purpose of CAT.” Nuru v. Gonzales, 404
F.3d 1207, 1221 (9th Cir. 2005) (quoting Wang v. Ashcroft, 320 F.3d 130, 134 (2d
Cir. 2003) (internal quotation marks omitted); see also 8 C.F.R. § 208.16(c)(2).
Petitioners expressed fears of future torture because of ongoing hostilities in

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Chechnya, but those concerns do not compel a finding that they will be subjected
to torture upon return to Russia.
The petition for review is DENIED.

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