[00:00:00] Speaker 04:
We'll turn to the first case on the argument calendar, case 24-6795, Panda versus Bondy.

[00:00:07] Speaker 04:
Good morning, and welcome back.

[00:00:09] Speaker 02:
Good morning.

[00:00:09] Speaker 02:
Yes, I was here on Monday.

[00:00:10] Speaker 02:
It's a pleasure to be able to stand before the same panel twice in one week.

[00:00:14] Speaker 02:
May it please the court, Aaron Vasey, on behalf of the petitioners, I'd like to save two minutes of my time for rebuttal, and I'll keep an eye on that clock.

[00:00:22] Speaker 02:
I do notice that the counsel for the respondents, at least not on my screen,

[00:00:27] Speaker 04:
Yes, let's make sure Council for the government can hear us.

[00:00:37] Speaker 02:
OK, OK, good.

[00:00:38] Speaker 02:
Thank you, sir.

[00:00:41] Speaker 02:
So this case centers on whether substantial evidence supports the immigration judge's conclusion that the petitioner did not suffer past persecution and did not demonstrate an objectively reasonable fear of future persecution.

[00:00:54] Speaker 02:
This case is unique because the IJ found the petitioner credible, yet rejected a number of the petitioner's core factual claims without reason, such that multiple parts of the IJ's decision are not supported by substantial evidence.

[00:01:06] Speaker 02:
Once we rectify this issue, we're left with a record that I think compels the conclusion that the petitioners have both suffered past persecution and demonstrated an objectively well-founded fear.

[00:01:15] Speaker 00:
There's a lot, pardon me, I didn't get the last, he suffered past persecution and

[00:01:20] Speaker 02:
and that they've demonstrated an objectively reasonable fear of future persecution in Angola.

[00:01:25] Speaker 02:
Now, I want to highlight the most egregious examples of the IJ rejecting facts in this manner and also explain how this issue spills over into other legal findings made by both the IJ and the agency.

[00:01:36] Speaker 02:
First, the record here clearly demonstrates that the petitioner escaped from police custody and that he lived in hiding afterwards until he left the country of Angola.

[00:01:46] Speaker 02:
These facts are important because they directly relate to whether the

[00:01:49] Speaker 02:
Angolan government had a continuing interest in the petitioner after his escape, and whether the harm his family suffered after his escape was related to the problems he was having around the election.

[00:02:00] Speaker 02:
In his decision, the IJ does not grapple with the evidence in the record that supports the petitioner's account of events.

[00:02:07] Speaker 02:
Here, this is not a single sentence in the petitioner's testimony where he says that he escaped.

[00:02:12] Speaker 02:
We have large swaths of testimony where the petitioner provides detailed accounts of how this

[00:02:17] Speaker 02:
escape plan came to be.

[00:02:19] Speaker 02:
How his wife, through her personal connection to the police chief, obtained information that the petitioner was at a higher risk of being killed after he hadn't been released from custody as he had during his prior arrest.

[00:02:30] Speaker 02:
The petitioner also describes the escape itself in detail how, in the dead of night, two police officers escorted him wordlessly out of his cell into a police vehicle where they escorted him to a location of his choosing.

[00:02:44] Speaker 02:
When the police officers dropped the petitioner off, they told him not to go outside.

[00:02:48] Speaker 02:
All these are indications that this is not a standard release from police custody, and none of this is addressed by the IJ or the agency.

[00:02:56] Speaker 02:
Instead, the IJ simply states that because two police officers were involved in the escape,

[00:03:00] Speaker 02:
The angle on government must have known about it, and therefore must also have known about the petitions.

[00:03:03] Speaker 03:
So these are facts that the agency should have considered in connection with the past persecution?

[00:03:08] Speaker 02:
Correct.

[00:03:09] Speaker 03:
So let me ask you this.

[00:03:10] Speaker 03:
How do they change the way in which we would look at past persecution if they were to be included?

[00:03:17] Speaker 02:
Understood.

[00:03:18] Speaker 02:
This fact is important because it explains how there's a clear connecting line between all the petitioners' problems around the election and the harm that his family suffered after this escape.

[00:03:27] Speaker 02:
In the IJs and the BIA's analysis, they refuse to consider the harm to these other family members.

[00:03:32] Speaker 02:
They see this as an isolated incident that, although unfortunate, has no connection to any of the other problems the petitioner faced.

[00:03:39] Speaker 02:
Because both the IJ and the BIA failed to consider this harm, they both concluded that the petitioner hadn't suffered past persecution and had no well-founded fear of future persecution.

[00:03:48] Speaker 02:
Again, once we accept that the record compels the petitioner's account of events, I think there's a clear connecting line between those two things.

[00:03:55] Speaker 03:
So if we were to agree with you

[00:03:58] Speaker 03:
That would be legal error on the part of the agency, is that correct?

[00:04:04] Speaker 02:
It could be, Your Honor.

[00:04:05] Speaker 02:
I think, again... Oh, I mean, what is it?

[00:04:09] Speaker 02:
Well, it's a factual issue.

[00:04:10] Speaker 02:
So the IJ, I think, makes a factual conclusion that's not supported by substantial evidence.

[00:04:15] Speaker 02:
That factual... And that's one way to describe it.

[00:04:17] Speaker 04:
I guess another way to describe it is just not considering evidence.

[00:04:20] Speaker 02:
That's another way to consider it too.

[00:04:21] Speaker 02:
That's what I thought.

[00:04:23] Speaker 02:
This is why this is a mixed question of law and fact.

[00:04:25] Speaker 02:
These facts affect directly the IJ and the agency's conclusion or I guess analysis of past persecution.

[00:04:33] Speaker 04:
So what's the appropriate remedy to, if we agree with what you're saying, to let the IJ consider this again?

[00:04:40] Speaker 02:
I think the record again compels the conclusion that the petitioner suffered past persecution.

[00:04:44] Speaker 02:
I would ask the court to make that finding and the remand of the agency to make further findings about the other elements of asylum.

[00:04:50] Speaker 02:
So the BIA, for example, didn't reach nexus.

[00:04:54] Speaker 02:
That's an issue that still needs to be addressed.

[00:04:57] Speaker 03:
The only problem is if we were to say that it was legal heir, we have to tell the agency that they

[00:05:04] Speaker 03:
You know, made a legal error and they, you know, you need to correct it and say, do this correctly.

[00:05:11] Speaker 02:
I think it's both a legal error and a factual error.

[00:05:13] Speaker 03:
Is there anything else in the record that would support finding a past persecution?

[00:05:20] Speaker 02:
Yes, I think there's other facts in the petitioner's past that were glossed over by the IJ and the agency.

[00:05:30] Speaker 02:
I want to zoom out and look at the bigger picture here.

[00:05:33] Speaker 02:
All of the harm in this case takes place within a context of political turmoil in Angola between the MPLA, which controls the government and the UNITA political party.

[00:05:43] Speaker 02:
This court has consistently held that the context matters and can make the difference in the persecution analysis if there's objective evidence that individuals like the petitioner are being singled out for persecution.

[00:05:54] Speaker 02:
The petitioner in this case was a high-level UNITA activist.

[00:05:57] Speaker 02:
He was organizing protests, he was leading groups around ahead of the elections, and he's suffered past harm that one would expect for someone in this context.

[00:06:06] Speaker 02:
He testified that he'd been arrested

[00:06:08] Speaker 02:
multiple times.

[00:06:09] Speaker 02:
The wife's sworn statement in this case actually said that he was quote, always arrested whenever protests took place.

[00:06:15] Speaker 02:
He testified that he'd suffered physical harm in the past that resulted in scars on his body.

[00:06:20] Speaker 02:
And he said that this harm didn't motivate him to leave the country because at the time he was still

[00:06:23] Speaker 02:
Here we have a petitioner that is politically active because he wants to enact change in his country.

[00:06:29] Speaker 02:
He's not looking for an excuse to flee and seek asylum here in the United States.

[00:06:34] Speaker 02:
This is harm that the IJ didn't consider, the BIA did consider it, but it minimized the harm because the petitioner stated that it wasn't a factor in his final decision to actually flee the country for his own safety.

[00:06:46] Speaker 02:
In addition to that past harm, we have the threats that the petitioner received around the election.

[00:06:51] Speaker 02:
So these are threats made by a group of people, so both police officers and MPLA members.

[00:06:57] Speaker 02:
The threat was made to the petitioner while he was part of a group, but the petitioner testified that he was leading this group.

[00:07:03] Speaker 02:
The record also demonstrates that that threat was carried through.

[00:07:06] Speaker 02:
Just a few days later, the police arrive at the petitioner's home to arbitrarily arrest him and detain him for 10 days.

[00:07:15] Speaker 02:
And then I think this court does need to consider the harm to these family members after this escape.

[00:07:21] Speaker 02:
The petitioner escaped from police custody just a few days later.

[00:07:23] Speaker 02:
Individuals show up at the petitioner's home looking for him.

[00:07:26] Speaker 02:
These are individuals associated with the MPLA party, the same party that controls the government, that controls the police, the same type of individuals that issued the threat to the petitioner before the election took place.

[00:07:39] Speaker 02:
I think all of this, well,

[00:07:42] Speaker 02:
This harm to the family members was severe.

[00:07:45] Speaker 02:
So the petitioner's wife was beaten.

[00:07:47] Speaker 02:
She was threatened.

[00:07:48] Speaker 02:
The petitioner's infant child, one year old, was locked in a freezer to pressure the petitioner's spouse to disclose his location.

[00:07:56] Speaker 02:
And all this did have an effect on the petitioner himself, even though he wasn't present when this harm took place.

[00:08:00] Speaker 02:
The petitioner testified that when he learned about this attack on his family members, what he wanted to do

[00:08:05] Speaker 02:
was turn himself into the authorities.

[00:08:07] Speaker 02:
Even though he knew that that would result in his death, he wanted to do anything that he could to protect his family members from further harm.

[00:08:14] Speaker 02:
I think all of that together in the country condition evidence compels a conclusion of past persecution.

[00:08:24] Speaker 02:
I also want to highlight additional facts about the attack at the family's home that

[00:08:28] Speaker 02:
makes it clear that there's a connection between that harm and the other problems the petitioner had.

[00:08:34] Speaker 02:
Again, proximity and time.

[00:08:36] Speaker 02:
The petitioner escaped from police custody, and then just four days later, these individuals arrive at the home associated with the MPLA party.

[00:08:44] Speaker 02:
I see that I'm running out of time before I yield my time.

[00:08:46] Speaker 02:
I just want to address the respondents argument that we've waved certain challenges to the ideas conclusions about how country conditions in Angola have have evolved.

[00:08:56] Speaker 02:
We're here because the petitioners challenge agencies finding

[00:08:59] Speaker 02:
that he hasn't demonstrated a well-founded fear of future persecution.

[00:09:02] Speaker 02:
Country condition evidence is a necessary part of that legal analysis.

[00:09:06] Speaker 02:
And in the petitioner's opening brief, we repeatedly cite two country condition evidence when talking about past persecution and future persecution.

[00:09:13] Speaker 02:
Here, we're directing the court to country condition evidence in the record that directly conflicts with the IJ's brief assessment of country conditions in Angola.

[00:09:22] Speaker 02:
This is something that both the IJ and the BIA acknowledged was mixed, that there is evidence of

[00:09:27] Speaker 02:
police abuse of impunity of political prisoners, but there also is evidence that the angle on governance taking some steps, some steps to mitigate.

[00:09:37] Speaker 04:
Okay, we'll put two minutes on the clock when you come back.

[00:09:39] Speaker 04:
Thank you.

[00:09:42] Speaker 04:
Okay, we'll hear now from the attorney general.

[00:09:50] Speaker 01:
Hello, may I please to quote John Stanton for the Attorney General?

[00:09:54] Speaker 01:
I hope I'm coming through, okay?

[00:09:56] Speaker 04:
You can't, you are, and good morning, sir.

[00:09:58] Speaker 04:
or good afternoon to you.

[00:09:59] Speaker 01:
Hello, just very, very briefly.

[00:10:01] Speaker 01:
In our answering brief, we charged that petitioners claimed for reversal regarding his claim for the protection of the Convention Against Torture was for functoring undeveloped.

[00:10:15] Speaker 01:
In his reply brief, he says absolutely nothing in response.

[00:10:17] Speaker 01:
In his oral argument, he says nothing in response.

[00:10:19] Speaker 01:
So as far as we're concerned, the CAC claim has been waived and abandoned.

[00:10:23] Speaker 01:
So, with respect to the silent claim, I hope the court received our Rule 28-J letter that we submitted on Wednesday afternoon regarding the Supreme Court's recent decision that held that the substantial evidence review applies to all evidence findings regarding past persecution and

[00:10:46] Speaker 01:
That's essentially what we're fighting about.

[00:10:51] Speaker 01:
Sister's counsel basically argues the facts, but the substantial evidence review so long as the agency was reasonable.

[00:11:00] Speaker 04:
Well, how about the argument that really the IJ and BIA decisions are providing a more sanitized account of

[00:11:11] Speaker 04:
petitioners release or escape from detention and the time he spent in hiding.

[00:11:18] Speaker 01:
Well, we're not sure like he spent time in hiding.

[00:11:21] Speaker 01:
He was living with his pastor.

[00:11:23] Speaker 01:
He never claimed that he used the word, he did not use the word hiding.

[00:11:26] Speaker 01:
The pastor did not use the word hiding.

[00:11:28] Speaker 01:
He lived with the pastor.

[00:11:29] Speaker 01:
And besides everything else, the police knew where he was.

[00:11:34] Speaker 04:
Didn't he say he was told not to go outside?

[00:11:36] Speaker 04:
Didn't he say he was told not to go outside?

[00:11:39] Speaker 01:
I don't recall that, but even if he weren't hiding, the police never charged him with any particular crimes.

[00:11:51] Speaker 01:
It seems incongruous for the police to drop him off someplace and not do anything about him.

[00:12:00] Speaker 04:
Isn't the argument that his wife managed, seemingly through a bribe, to get

[00:12:07] Speaker 04:
the petitioner released from custody in the middle of the night, and he was then taken to this, the pastor's house, and I mean, it's not clear to me that the IJ and BIA fully grappled with the import of what he was claiming.

[00:12:22] Speaker 04:
How do you respond to that?

[00:12:25] Speaker 01:
Well, I mean, as I said before, I mean, the government has not shown any continuing interest in him.

[00:12:32] Speaker 01:
And to be honest, I mean, while the agency didn't actually make any nexus findings, it seems pretty clear that he was arrested in connection with an investigation for Arson, as opposed to any political activities.

[00:12:47] Speaker 01:
So, I mean, the election already happened in August 2022.

[00:12:52] Speaker 01:
Shortly after that, the MPLA building was firebombed or lit on fire intentionally by us and the police for whatever reason thought he had something to do with it.

[00:13:05] Speaker 01:
So, I mean, as we said in a brief, it's perfectly legitimate for governments to like.

[00:13:11] Speaker 01:
conduct investigations, including holding suspects who are accused of a crime.

[00:13:21] Speaker 04:
Why was he then released in the middle of the night?

[00:13:22] Speaker 04:
You know, under the circumstances that he claims.

[00:13:28] Speaker 01:
Well, at least of the circumstances, well, I mean, according to petitioner, I mean, like his wife was the hairstylist to the police chief's wife.

[00:13:38] Speaker 01:
They probably talked.

[00:13:39] Speaker 01:
We don't know why exactly it happened then.

[00:13:41] Speaker 01:
It's certainly possible they were intending to release him, and they dropped him off at the pastor's house as a favor to him to like avoid any potential harassment from the MPLA.

[00:13:54] Speaker 04:
This is the issue to me with just the record.

[00:13:58] Speaker 04:
There is testimony from him that he was at risk.

[00:14:02] Speaker 04:
That's what he claims prompted his wife to come and use this connection she had, and she says the same thing.

[00:14:12] Speaker 04:
And I guess the question is, is that sufficiently accounted for in the agency decision?

[00:14:17] Speaker 01:
I believe so.

[00:14:18] Speaker 01:
I mean, like, there's a presumption that the police, that the agency considered all the evidence.

[00:14:23] Speaker 01:
I mean, I believe the board discussed that exact, I mean, incident in its opinion.

[00:14:30] Speaker 01:
So it was, in fact, considered the fact that the agency didn't view the evidence in the same way that petitioner would have preferred, does not show that the record compels reversal.

[00:14:39] Speaker 03:
I mean, that's what substantial evidence review is all about, so long as- Mr. Stanton, could I, let me, may I ask you a question?

[00:14:48] Speaker 03:
You would agree, wouldn't you, that if we were to conclude that the agency did not fully consider all the material facts in the case, that that would be legal error, is that correct?

[00:15:05] Speaker 01:
If the district could show that the agency ignored or did not consider evidence under this court's precedent in the Lopez case, then yes, I would agree it would be legal there.

[00:15:20] Speaker 03:
And then the remedy would be to remand it back to the agency so they can consider all the evidence.

[00:15:25] Speaker 03:
Isn't that correct?

[00:15:27] Speaker 01:
That would be the usual remedy, yes, Your Honor, yes.

[00:15:29] Speaker 03:
And then at that point, the whole notion or the idea that substantial evidence review, as we now are required to do, would then kick in, is that correct?

[00:15:44] Speaker 01:
Well, I'm not sure I understand Your Honor's question.

[00:15:48] Speaker 03:
Well, I mean, so under Oriana, the Supreme Court's recent case that you referred to a few minutes ago,

[00:15:57] Speaker 03:
Uh, past persecution is reviewed for substantial evidence.

[00:16:02] Speaker 03:
Yes.

[00:16:03] Speaker 03:
Right.

[00:16:03] Speaker 03:
Yes.

[00:16:04] Speaker 03:
Okay.

[00:16:04] Speaker 03:
But that, that only makes sense to me if what you're, if, if the record before us has been fully considered by the board, right?

[00:16:13] Speaker 01:
Yes.

[00:16:13] Speaker 01:
Yes.

[00:16:13] Speaker 01:
I agree with that.

[00:16:14] Speaker 03:
Yes.

[00:16:14] Speaker 03:
So if they're, so if they, if we were to determine or we're going to agree with the petitioner, the certain material facts were not properly considered by the board or the agency, then

[00:16:26] Speaker 03:
The remedy would be to send it back, tell them to consider those facts, and then we take it from there.

[00:16:33] Speaker 01:
Correct?

[00:16:33] Speaker 01:
Yes, consider those facts, and probably while they're at, address some of the other elements for asylum as well, like Alexis relocation, things of that nature.

[00:16:41] Speaker 01:
So I would agree that would be the remedy.

[00:16:43] Speaker 01:
But again, we don't agree with that that's what happened here.

[00:16:46] Speaker 01:
Right, I understand.

[00:16:47] Speaker 03:
We believe the... I understand that.

[00:16:51] Speaker ?:
Okay.

[00:16:52] Speaker 01:
All right, and with respect to the incident with the wife and children, I mean, again, very, very unfortunate, but I mean, this court's presence makes clear that ordinarily harm to friends and family ordinarily are not considered persecution to the asylum applicant.

[00:17:12] Speaker 01:
unless it creates a pattern of persecution, closely tied to the applicant.

[00:17:16] Speaker 04:
I don't know that the harm to the family has to create the pattern.

[00:17:20] Speaker 04:
I think that the harm has to be part of the pattern, right?

[00:17:25] Speaker 04:
So that, I think the argument here would be, well, it was part of a pattern considering that it was four days after he was released and then people came to his wife's house

[00:17:37] Speaker 04:
and assaulted her trying to find out where he was living, right?

[00:17:40] Speaker 04:
So that, I mean, the BIA referred to this as isolated, but I'm not sure that really is consistent with the record.

[00:17:48] Speaker 01:
Well, I mean, like the word create does appear in other court's opinions.

[00:17:51] Speaker 01:
I know in the Sharma decision that you wrote, I mean, said it had to be part of a pattern of a persecution, but other, I mean, the Arientaf,

[00:18:03] Speaker 01:
I'm blanking on the name.

[00:18:04] Speaker 01:
The 1997 case said it has to create the pattern, but it was isolated.

[00:18:10] Speaker 01:
I mean, nothing else happened to the wife or family and daughter.

[00:18:15] Speaker 01:
They relocated to another town.

[00:18:18] Speaker 01:
Petitioner says she wasn't hiding, but there's, I mean, based on what?

[00:18:23] Speaker 04:
And just moving to another town is not- I think maybe based on being assaulted and having the child assaulted would be the reason.

[00:18:31] Speaker 01:
But the child was not harmed.

[00:18:33] Speaker 01:
The child was placed either a freezer or a closet, but the record indicates the child did not suffer any physical harm.

[00:18:42] Speaker 01:
I don't know if they were gentle with her or not, but the child was not harmed, not assaulted.

[00:18:47] Speaker 03:
Mr. Stanton, I'd like to ask you another question about the record.

[00:18:52] Speaker 03:
When I was looking over this, as I recall, the wife got involved in negotiating with the

[00:19:02] Speaker 03:
her connection with the chief of police and whatnot to help get him released.

[00:19:08] Speaker 03:
And I recall reading that the chief, the police chief told her that she may not see Panda again.

[00:19:18] Speaker 03:
And then later the pastor tells her also in his declaration, he said that Panda stayed with him because the police wanted to kill Panda.

[00:19:34] Speaker 03:
That struck me as implied threats of death.

[00:19:42] Speaker 01:
It seems incongruent that the police would want to kill him after they brought them all someplace.

[00:19:50] Speaker 01:
Not that the police would.

[00:19:52] Speaker 01:
There are much easier ways to do that.

[00:19:53] Speaker 01:
They have the opportunity to harm, they did not.

[00:19:56] Speaker 03:
That the police wanted to kill him, it's that the other side wanted to kill him.

[00:20:05] Speaker 01:
Okay, well, I mean, that's, to the extent Judge Bless was talking about a pattern, I mean, that's a totally different pattern than, I mean, so I would think the pattern has to come from the same source of harm.

[00:20:16] Speaker 01:
Some of the cases that we've cited in our brief, finding a pattern of persecution, the source of harm is usually the same, either it's the same gang or the government.

[00:20:26] Speaker 01:
It's not, I mean, it's not the government plus thugs.

[00:20:31] Speaker 01:
So, I mean, it's, I would say that's an entirely different pattern.

[00:20:35] Speaker 01:
To the extent of pattern at all.

[00:20:36] Speaker 01:
It's only one incident, so I tried to find a situation where this court is held one incident does not create a pattern in the in the persecution context.

[00:20:46] Speaker 01:
The court has made that point in other contexts constructed notice delivered indifference, but it has to be in persecution.

[00:20:51] Speaker 01:
But I mean.

[00:20:52] Speaker 01:
We think pattern has to mean something like that.

[00:20:55] Speaker 01:
There's just not a pattern of a persecution based, but MPLA against petitioner on this record.

[00:21:04] Speaker 01:
I mean, they may have been angry at him because they suspected that he was involved in the auction of their building, but

[00:21:12] Speaker 01:
They haven't contacted him or looked for him or looked for the wife ever since the September 22 incident.

[00:21:20] Speaker 01:
And so, I mean, I just don't think there's a pattern here.

[00:21:25] Speaker 01:
The police don't seem to care about him.

[00:21:26] Speaker 01:
He left the country without any issues with the assistance of the police chief.

[00:21:31] Speaker 01:
I mean, no one's really looking to kill this guy.

[00:21:35] Speaker 03:
Okay.

[00:21:36] Speaker 03:
Okay.

[00:21:36] Speaker 03:
Thank you.

[00:21:36] Speaker 04:
All right.

[00:21:36] Speaker 04:
We've let you go a little over, so I want to thank you very much for your presentation.

[00:21:40] Speaker 04:
And we'll hear now from Mr. Basie.

[00:21:43] Speaker 02:
Thank you, Your Honors.

[00:21:51] Speaker 02:
I just want to highlight a few things to address the response argument.

[00:21:56] Speaker 02:
The petitioner did say that he was living in hiding with the pastor.

[00:22:00] Speaker 02:
He testified that no one else knew where he was.

[00:22:02] Speaker 02:
If you also check the pastor's sworn statement, it suggests that he was in hiding, that he was there for his protection because people wanted to kill him, as Your Honor pointed out.

[00:22:11] Speaker 02:
I also want to highlight the country condition evidence in the long history of this conflict between UNITA and MPLA.

[00:22:17] Speaker 02:
This conflict dates back to the country's independence in 1974.

[00:22:22] Speaker 02:
Since then, the MPLA has controlled the government and UNITA has been the primary opposition party.

[00:22:26] Speaker 02:
I think it's ridiculous to say that this conflict has only now recently resolved itself.

[00:22:34] Speaker 02:
The respondent also minimizes other instances of harm, especially when talking about the petitioner's family members.

[00:22:42] Speaker 02:
The petitioner's infant child was harmed, and there's objective evidence in the record about that on page 185.

[00:22:48] Speaker 02:
We have an extent of the harm.

[00:22:50] Speaker 02:
The extent of the harm, I think, was limited to the child being forced into this freezer or closet to pressure the petitioner's spouse to reveal the location.

[00:22:59] Speaker 02:
And so the injuries are commensurate with that.

[00:23:01] Speaker 02:
And so the medical report just notes bruising and body weakness.

[00:23:05] Speaker 02:
But the petitioner's spouse and his child were at the hospital for two days after this attack.

[00:23:09] Speaker 02:
I think this harm is severe.

[00:23:11] Speaker 02:
I also want to point out that the petitioner received threats before the election

[00:23:16] Speaker 02:
from a group, a mixed group of both police officers and MPLA members.

[00:23:21] Speaker 02:
So there's already evidence in the record that these two, I guess, groups, if we want to characterize them as different groups, are acting together to carry out the same kind of pattern of persecution.

[00:23:29] Speaker 02:
The attackers at the home were also MPLA members.

[00:23:32] Speaker 02:
So again, I think the record really does compel a finding of past persecution.

[00:23:38] Speaker 02:
That's what we'd ask the court to do today.

[00:23:40] Speaker 02:
Thank you.

[00:23:42] Speaker 04:
Thanks to both counsel for the briefing and argument.

[00:23:44] Speaker 04:
The case is submitted.