Loya v. Garland

• Decision Date: 09 August 2022
• Docket Number: 21-9594
• Parties: GREGORIO GODINEZ LOYA, Petitioner, v. MERRICK B. GARLAND, United States Attorney General, Respondent.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Tenth Circuit

GREGORIO GODINEZ LOYA, Petitioner,
v.
MERRICK B. GARLAND, United States Attorney General, Respondent.

No. 21-9594

United States Court of Appeals, Tenth Circuit

August 9, 2022

Before TYMKOVICH, Chief Judge, MATHESON and EID, Circuit Judges.

ORDER AND JUDGMENT ^[*]

Timothy M. Tymkovich Chief Judge

Gregorio Godinez Loya is a Mexican national who seeks review of a Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) decision denying his motion for reconsideration. We dismiss in part and deny in part the petition for review.

I

Loya is subject to a removal order from 1996. He also has an extensive criminal record, including three unlawful-reentry convictions, see 8 U.S.C. § 1326(a),

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a felony drug-trafficking conviction, and two felony convictions for driving under the influence. When Loya was most recently apprehended, the Department of Homeland Security reinstated his removal order, see id. § 1231(a)(5), and placed him in withholding-only proceedings, during which he applied for withholding of removal and relief under the Convention Against Torture (CAT).

After a hearing, an immigration judge (IJ) denied Loya's applications on multiple grounds. First, the IJ determined that several of his convictions constituted particularly serious crimes (PSCs) that rendered him ineligible for withholding of removal under both the Immigration &Nationality Act (INA) and the CAT. See id. § 1231(b)(3)(B)(ii); 8 C.F.R. § 1208.16(d)(2); Villegas-Castro v. Garland, 19 F.4th 1241, 1244 (10th Cir. 2021). Alternatively, the IJ ruled that for numerous reasons on the merits Loya was not entitled to withholding of removal under either the INA or the CAT. And finally, the IJ concluded that Loya failed to show he was entitled to deferral of removal under the CAT.

Loya appealed to the BIA, challenging some of the IJ's merits rulings for denying withholding of removal under the INA and the CAT. But he failed to challenge the IJ's other rulings-that his PSCs rendered him ineligible for relief and that he was not entitled to deferral of removal under the CAT. Thus, the BIA affirmed the IJ on the unchallenged grounds and dismissed the appeal. Loya did not file a petition for review.

Instead, Loya filed a motion for reconsideration, repeating his arguments challenging the IJ's merits rulings that he was not entitled to withholding of removal

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or CAT protection. The BIA declined to reconsider those issues, stating that a motion for reconsideration was not an opportunity to reargue previous contentions or raise new arguments that could have been previously...