Tiani v. Holder

UNPUBLISHED UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT No. 09-1601 TCHENANG DANY-LUCIENNE TIANI, Petitioner, v. ERIC H. HOLDER, JR., Attorney General, Respondent. On Petition for Review of an Order of the Board of Immigration Appeals. Submitted: November 19, 2009 Decided: January 4, 2010 Before GREGORY, DUNCAN, and AGEE, Circuit Judges. Petition denied by unpublished per curiam opinion. Edward Neufville, III, MORAISNEUFVILLE LAW FIRM, LLC, Silver Spring, Maryland, for Petitioner. Tony West, Assistant Attorney General, Daniel E. Goldman, Senior Litigation Counsel, Jonathan Robbins, Office of Immigration Litigation, UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Washington, D.C., for Respondent. Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. PER CURIAM: Tchenang Dany-Lucienne Tiani, a native and citizen of Cameroon, petitions for review of an order of the Board of Immigration Appeals (“Board”) denying her motion to reconsider its order dismissing her appeal from the immigration judge’s denial of her motion to reopen. We deny the petition for review. The Board’s denial of a motion to reconsider is reviewed for abuse of discretion. Jean v. Gonzales, 435 F.3d 475, 481 (4th Cir. 2006); 8 C.F.R. § 1003.2(a) (2009). A motion to reconsider asserts the Board made an error in its earlier decision. The movant must specify the error of fact or law in the Board’s prior decision. See 8 U.S.C. § 1229a(c)(6) (2006); 8 C.F.R. § 1003.2(b)(1). The Board’s broad discretion will be reversed only if its decision “lacked a rational explanation, departed from established policies, or rested on an impermissible basis.” Jean, 435 F.3d at 483 (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). The burden is on the movant to establish that reconsideration is warranted. INS v. Abudu, 485 U.S. 94, 110-11 (1988). “To be within a mile of being granted, a motion for reconsideration has to give the tribunal to which it is addressed a reason for changing its mind.” Ahmed v. Ashcroft, 388 F.3d 247, 249 (7th Cir. 2004). Motions that simply repeat contentions that have already been rejected are 2 insufficient to convince the Board to reconsider a previous decision. Id. We find the Board did not abuse its discretion in finding that there was no error of law in the earlier order. The Board reviewed the record, including Tiani’s affidavit, to find she did not make a prima facie showing of either past persecution or a well-founded fear of persecution. Accordingly, we deny the petition for review. We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal contentions are adequately presented in the materials before the court and argument would not aid the decisional process. PETITION DENIED 3