Date: 20090414
Docket:
IMM-4237-08
Citation: 2009
FC 369
Ottawa, Ontario, April 14, 2009
PRESENT: The Honourable Mr. Justice Martineau
BETWEEN:
OTHONIEL CASTILLO GONZALEZ
LADY ELIZABETH CONTRERAS MUNOZ
and ANGELINNE CASTILLO CONTRERAS
Applicants
and
THE MINISTER OF CITIZENSHIP
AND IMMIGRATION
Respondent
REASONS FOR JUDGMENT AND
JUDGMENT
[1]
The
applicants are challenging the legality of a decision of the Refugee Protection
Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada (the Board), dated September 2, 2008,
finding that the applicants are neither “Convention refugees” nor “persons in
need of protection” under sections 96 and 97 of the Immigration
and Refugee Protection Act, S.C. 2001 c. 27, as amended. The
applicants’ lack of credibility with respect to the essential elements of their
claim was determinative.
[2]
The
principal applicant, his spouse and their daughter are Mexican citizens. On
June 30, 2007, the principal applicant allegedly witnessed a minor
woman being raped by members of a group called “Mara Salvatrucha.” He tried to
help the victim, which resulted in the attackers going after him. However, the
applicant was able to flee. On that same day, the applicant apparently received
death threats from members of the group. Following that incident, the
applicants left their home to take refuge at a ranch in the city of Alvarado. The applicant claims that he
had contacted Eduardo Vasquez Badillo in order to lodge a complaint with the
public prosecutor, but was strongly advised to leave. Therefore, the complaint
was never filed. The applicant came to Canada on July 20, 2007. On
July 25, 2007, Mara Salvatrucha members presumably entered the
applicants’ home in the city of Veracruz.
They looted the premises and stole some of the applicants’ identity documents.
The applicant’s spouse claims that she was there when this happened. After that
incident, the applicant’s spouse and daughter joined him in Canada on
November 7, 2007.
[3]
The
Board rejected the applicants’ refugee protection claim because they lacked
credibility on essential elements of their narrative. First, the Board noted
the contradictions in the female applicant’s testimony as well as between her
testimony, her Personal Information Form (PIF) and the point-of-entry
documents.
[4]
Among
other things, the female applicant alleged that she and her daughter had taken
refuge at a ranch in Alvarado, Veracruz, from
July 13, 2007, until they left Mexico for Canada. However, her PIF and the point-of-entry
documents state that she had lived at the same address in a town in Veracruz for ten years. That
contradiction was not satisfactorily explained at the hearing, especially since
the female applicant had stated at the start of the hearing that her PIF and
the documents enclosed with it were complete, true and accurate.
[5]
Then
the female applicant testified that Mara members entered the applicants’ house
in the city of Veracruz on July 25, 2007,
and that she was there at the time. Yet, she had stated earlier that she had
not returned to the city of Veracruz after seeking refuge at the
ranch. Confronted by the Board on this contradictory testimony, she was unable
to provide satisfactory explanations. The Board noted later on that the female
applicant offered acceptable explanations after her counsel invited her to
justify the contradiction. However, the Board assigned them little probative
value because they were provided later on in the hearing.
[6]
Second,
the Board alleges that the male applicant omitted to mention in his PIF an
element crucial to his claim, namely, that Mara members had presumably stolen
his wallet and identity documents when they entered his home in July 2007,
and that, as a result, they would be able to find him anywhere in Mexico. Yet,
he had stated at the start of the hearing that the information in his PIF was
complete, true and accurate.
[7]
Finally,
the Board pointed out the lack of documentary evidence corroborating the
central elements of the applicants’ claim, specifically,
a. a document corroborating that
the applicants had lived on the ranch from July to November 2007, and
b. a document stating that the
male applicant had consulted the lawyer, Eduardo Vasquez Badillo,
from the city of Veracruz, following the June 2007
incident.
[8]
This
application for judicial review must be dismissed. The applicants are not
seriously disputing the reasonableness of the findings of fact stated clearly
in the Board’s impugned decision. They are basically claiming that the Board
did not ask them to file additional evidence corroborating that they had lived
on a ranch following the alleged events.
[9]
Learned
counsel for the applicants, who had also represented them at the hearing before
the Board, did not make an application to provide additional documents during
or after the hearing, in accordance with section 37 of the Refugee
Protection Division Rules, SOR/2002-228, as amended. The applicants were
represented by experienced counsel at all times. In this case, the Board was
not at all obligated to invite the applicants afterwards to file additional
evidence that would corroborate their narrative. The truthfulness of the
applicants’ allegations is very questionable because of the contradictions
noted in the impugned decision. Thus, due to the lack of evidence corroborating
the applicants’ narrative, it was reasonable for the Board to find their claim
very weak.
[10]
This
Court must give a great deal of deference to the Board’s decisions concerning
questions of credibility and of assessing the evidence. Since most of the
negative findings in the impugned decisions were not refuted by the applicants,
it is not the Court’s role, within the framework of an application for judicial
review, to reassess the evidence and substitute its own opinion for that of the
Board. Even if the error alleged by the applicants were admitted (which is not
the case here), it would not be determinative. Having taken care to examine the
existence of justification,
transparency and intelligibility within the decision-making process and
considering that the Board’s non-credibility finding falls within a range of
possible, acceptable outcomes which are defensible in respect of the facts and
law (Dunsmuir
v. New-Brunswick, 2008 SCC 9, [2008] 1 S.C.R. 190 at para. 47), I am
of the opinion that there is no valid reason to set aside the impugned decision
and return the matter to the Board.
[11]
Therefore,
this application for judicial review must be dismissed. Counsel have not
proposed a question to be certified, and I agree that this matter raises none.
JUDGMENT
THE COURT ORDERS AND ADJUDGES
that the
application for judicial review be dismissed. No question is certified.
“Luc
Martineau”
Certified
true translation
Margarita
Gorbounova, Translator
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