Tatiana Charadze v. Attorney General of the United States

NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
No. 08-2894
TATIANA CHARADZE,
Petitioner
v.
ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES,
Respondent
On Petition for Review of an Order of the
Board of Immigration Appeals
(Agency No. A98-975-460)
Immigration Judge: Honorable Henry S. Dogin
Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a)
January 4, 2010
Before: AMBRO, CHAGARES and ALDISERT, Circuit Judges
(Opinion filed January 11, 2010)
OPINION
PER CURIAM
Petitioner, Tatiana Charadze, is a sixty-two-year-old native and citizen of Russia
who came to the United States in 1996 as a non-immigrant visitor authorized to stay in the

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The IJ ultimately found that Charadze’s asylum application, filed in 2005, was1
not time barred, based on Charadze’s presentation of a legitimate certified receipt dated in
April 1997, which was addressed to the INS.
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United States until January 1997. Although she had applied for asylum and withholding
of removal in 1997, the Service did not act on her application until she filed a second one
in July 2005. Charadze was placed in removal proceedings for overstaying her visa in1
January 2006. Through counsel, Charadze conceded removability, renewed her request
for asylum and withholding of removal, and applied for relief under the Convention
Against Torture (“CAT”).
Charadze claims that she was persecuted in Russia for her religious beliefs as a
Baptist. At her removal hearing, Charadze testified that she became a Baptist when her
daughter, Irina, was diagnosed with cancer. (A.R. at 84.) On the day that Charadze was
baptized in 1980, individuals, whom she referred to as “skinheads,” attacked the Baptist
gathering with chains and sticks. (Id. at 65-66.) She suffered a concussion but did not
seek treatment, and no one called the police. (Id. at 66-67.) Other incidents perpetrated
by “skinheads” or other individuals against her and other Baptists occurred in 1985 (they
broke up a Baptist meeting from which Charadze escaped without injury) and 1989
(vandalized her home, leaving written messages against Baptists and threats of harm if
she complained to the police). (Id. at 68, 72, 127.) In 1995, two men dragged Charadze’s
two-year-old granddaughter by the hair, causing the child to fall and hit her head. (A.R.
at 71.) Charadze believed the men were Russian nationalists because they sported

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armbands. (Id. at 72.) She did not call the police because she felt that it would be useless
to do so. (Id.) Charadze moved to another location in Russia, however. (Id. at 76.)
Charadze also testified to two incidents, arguably involving the police on both
occasions. In 1982, the police broke up a Baptist meeting attended by Charadze. (Id. at
67-68.) She was not injured or apprehended. (Id. at 67.) In 1992 (around the time that
the Soviet Union fell and Russia became an independent country), four men in
plainclothes apprehended Charadze on the street, took her to a building that she later
learned was a police precinct, placed her in a cell, covered her head with a plastic bag,
and beat her with sticks, to get her to deny her Baptist faith. (A.R. at 69-70.) She was
held there for three days and then released. (Id. at 70.)
The incident that prompted Charadze to leave the country occurred in May 1996.
While Charadze was waiting at a bus stop after work, two men knocked her unconscious
and took her to a building, where they beat her severely, yelling “we will baptize you.”
(A.R. at 73.) Charadze took the men’s words to mean “we will crucify you.” (Id.) She
was rescued by a man who heard her crying for help. (Id.)
Charadze reapplied for asylum and other relief in 2005, when she learned from her
daughter, Irina, that Charadze’s husband, who had become a Baptist in 1990 and was
living in Russia, was killed. He was beaten by a group of people as he preached in
public. (A.R. at 80-81.) The police took him to a hospital where he later died. (Id. at
81.) Irina tried to file a formal complaint with the police, but they refused to open an

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In her brief, Charadze blames prior immigration counsel for failing to advise her2
to obtain additional documentation. (Pet. Br. at 25.) The Government argues that to the
extent that Charadze raises a new ineffectiveness of counsel claim, we lack jurisdiction to
review it because it is not exhausted. See 8 U.S.C. § 1252(d)(1). We agree. The record
indicates that the BIA had no notice of an ineffectiveness of counsel claim.
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investigation, blaming Charadze’s husband for his own demise. (Id.) Charadze said that
she feared returning to Russia and believed she will be harmed because she is a Baptist.
She feared for her two daughters who remain in Russia, even though they are not
Baptists. She offered letters confirming that she is a practicing Baptist in the United
States, and she submitted her husband’s death certificate. Charadze testified that she was
in constant telephone contact with her children and had spoken to her daughter Irina a day
before the hearing. (Id. at 74-75.) When asked why she did not provide medical records
for her husband or other corroborating evidence from her daughters and other relatives,
Charadze said that documentation of her baptism was destroyed when her home was
vandalized, (A.R. at 72 & 102), and that nobody told her that she needed to provide
corroborating evidence. (Id. at 85-86, 90-91, 93, 94; & 101-105.)2
The IJ denied asylum, withholding of removal and CAT relief, granted voluntary
departure, and entered an alternate order of removal to Russia. The IJ found that
Charadze provided no corroborating evidence to support her claims. Specifically, he
determined that, although there was evidence corroborating Charadze’s testimony that she
is a practicing Baptist in the United States, the evidence did not address whether she was
a Baptist while she was still living in Russia. Moreover, despite the fact that Charadze

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was in phone contact with Irina before the hearing, Irina did not write a letter or submit an
affidavit confirming the essential details of her mother’s story. The IJ noted that counsel
did not request a conference call with Irina at the hearing, which the IJ would have been
willing to allow.
The IJ also found that the death certificate did not prove or disprove Charadze’s
testimony that her husband was murdered. Charadze provided no medical records from
the hospital where her husband died to establish the cause of death. The IJ noted that
Irina (who works in a legal office in Russia) could have found out how to obtain such
records and, most important, she could have corroborated that the police actively refused
to investigate. The IJ concluded that Charadze’s uncorroborated testimony, especially
concerning the circumstances of her husband’s death, was implausible, and thus she failed
to meet her burden of showing past persecution or a well-founded fear of future
persecution for asylum purposes. Because she could not meet the asylum standard, the IJ
found that Charadze failed to prove her eligibility under the stricter standards for
withholding of removal and for CAT relief. The Board of Immigration Appeals (“BIA”)
affirmed, without opinion, the results of the IJ’s decision and dismissed Charadze’s
appeal. The BIA allowed her to voluntarily depart within forty-five days of its order.
This timely petition for review followed.
We have jurisdiction to review a final order of removal under 8 U.S.C. § 1252(a).
Where the BIA summarily affirms and adopts the IJ’s decision, this Court has jurisdiction

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Noting that there is no evidence that Charadze’s earlier asylum application was3
actually filed in 1997, the Government asserts that the REAL ID ACT’s corroboration
standard applies in Charadze’s case because she filed her asylum application in 2005,
after the Act’s effective date. The REAL ID Act merely codified existing law regarding
corroboration. See Chukwu v. Attorney General, 484 F.3d 185, 192 (3d Cir. 2007).
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to review the IJ’s opinion. Dia v. Ashcroft, 353 F.3d 228, 242-43 (3d Cir. 2003) (BIA
need not independently set forth basis for its decision where, by summarily affirming the
IJ’s decision, it “presents for our review the reasoning and decision of the IJ as that of the
Attorney General”). We must uphold the agency’s findings, including its determination
whether an alien was subject to persecution or has a well-founded fear of persecution, if
they are “supported by reasonable, substantial, and probative evidence on the record
considered as a whole.” INS v. Elias-Zacarias, 502 U.S. 478, 481 (1992) (quotation
omitted). Indeed, we may not reject these findings “unless any reasonable adjudicator
would be compelled to conclude to the contrary.” 8 U.S.C. § 1252(b)(4)(B); see also
Kibinda v. Attorney General, 477 F.3d 113, 119 (3d Cir. 2007).
Charadze protests that the IJ erred in finding that she provided no corroborating
evidence for key aspects of her case and that she failed to adequately explain its absence.
A denial of relief may be grounded on a failure to corroborate when “(1) the IJ identifies
facts for which it is reasonable to expect the applicant to produce corroboration, (2) the
applicant fails to corroborate, and (3) the applicant fails to adequately explain that
failure.” Chukwu v. Attorney General, 484 F.3d 185, 191-92 (3d Cir. 2007) (citing3
Abdulai v. Ashcroft, 239 F.3d 542, 554 (3d Cir. 2001)).

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Here, the IJ faulted Charadze for failing to present documentary or other
corroborating evidence that: (1) she was a practicing Baptist in Russia; (2) she was the
victim of harassment and beatings as a practicing Baptist in Russia; (3) her husband was
murdered for proselytizing the Baptist faith in public in Russia; and (4) the police refused
to investigate her husband’s death. We agree with the IJ that Charadze could have
obtained letters from family members regarding her Baptist faith and her experiences as a
Baptist in Russia. She could have obtained medical records to confirm that her husband
died in the hospital and to establish a cause of death. Furthermore, her daughter Irina was
reasonably available to provide documentary evidence regarding the circumstances of the
death of her father in 2005, and to the refusal of the police department to pursue the case.
We agree with the IJ that Charadze failed to adequately explain why she could not obtain
this corroborating evidence. Thus, we find nothing in this record that would compel us to
conclude that the IJ erred in ruling that Charadze failed to provide reasonably available
corroborating evidence.
Charadze asserts that the IJ rendered an adverse credibility determination as part of
his finding that Charadze failed to provide corroborating evidence. We disagree.
Because corroboration goes to the sufficiency of the evidence, it requires analysis
independent of an adverse credibility determination. See Chen v. Gonzales, 434 F.3d
212, 221 (3d Cir. 2005). Even a credible applicant may be required to supply
corroborating evidence to meet her burden of proof. Id. at 218. Because the IJ could not

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conclude that Charadze’s testimony was plausible in the absence of reasonably available
corroborating evidence, he found that she failed to meet her burden of proving eligibility
for asylum.
Based on the current record, we conclude that substantial evidence supports the
IJ’s determination that Charadze failed to meet her burdens of proof as to asylum,
withholding of removal, and relief under the CAT. Accordingly, we will deny the
petition for review.

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