Ronald Ramos v. William Barr ( 2020 )

NOT RECOMMENDED FOR PUBLICATION
File Name: 20a0574n.06
No. 20-3042
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT
FILED
Oct 07, 2020
RONALD OSVALDO RAMOS, )
DEBORAH S. HUNT, Clerk
)
Petitioner,
)
)
v. ON PETITION FOR REVIEW
) FROM THE BOARD OF
)
WILLIAM P. BARR, Attorney General, IMMIGRATION APPEALS
)
Respondent. )
Before: MERRITT, KETHLEDGE, and WHITE, Circuit Judges.
KETHLEDGE, Circuit Judge. An immigration judge ordered Ronald Osvaldo Ramos
removed when he failed to appear at his removal proceedings. Ramos moved to reopen those
proceedings 13 years later, asserting that he had not received notice of his removal hearing and
that exceptional circumstances excused his failure to appear. The IJ denied that motion, and the
Board of Immigration Appeals affirmed. We deny Ramos’s petition for review.
I.
In 1999, Ramos left El Salvador, crossed the U.S.-Mexico border without authorization,
and settled in Columbus, Ohio. The next year he applied for asylum. In March 2003, the
government mailed to Ramos’s Columbus address a notice to appear, which told him that the
government thought he was in the country illegally, that he was required to appear before an IJ for
a removal hearing in June 2003, and that he was required to inform the immigration court of any
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change in his mailing address. Nine days later, the government mailed a notice that said the room
for the hearing had changed.
Ramos failed to attend his hearing. That same month—June 2003—he moved to Canton
without notifying the immigration court of his new address. In August 2003, the government sent
to Ramos’s Columbus address a notice that it had rescheduled his removal hearing for the
following June. Ramos failed to attend that hearing as well, and the IJ ordered him removed in
absentia.
More than 13 years later—in February 2018—Ramos filed a motion to reopen his removal
proceedings, alleging that he had not received notice of his June 2003 and June 2004 removal
hearings and that exceptional circumstances excused his failure to appear. The IJ denied his
motion. The Board affirmed, finding that Ramos was properly “served by mail with the notice to
appear on March 24, 2003,” that the notice told him to notify the immigration court of any change
in his address, and that he failed to do so when he moved in June 2003. The Board also found that
his failure to appear was not due to exceptional circumstances. This petition followed.
II.
We review the Board’s denial of Ramos’s motion to reopen for an abuse of discretion.
Dieng v. Barr, 947 F.3d 956, 960 (6th Cir. 2020). In doing so, we treat the Board’s factual findings
as “conclusive unless any reasonable adjudicator would be compelled to conclude to the contrary.”
8 U.S.C. § 1252(b)(4)(B).
Ramos argues that he did not receive the notice to appear sent to his Columbus address in
March 2003. See id. § 1229a(b)(5)(C)(ii). But Ramos concedes that he was living at that address
at the time the notice was sent to him there. We therefore presume, as the Board did, that Ramos
actually received it. See Valadez-Lara v. Barr, 963 F.3d 560, 566 (6th Cir. 2020). Ramos’s
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unsupported assertion that he did not receive the notice, in an affidavit made over 13 years later,
is not enough to rebut that presumption. See Santos-Santos v. Barr, 917 F.3d 486, 492–93 (6th
Cir. 2019). Ramos also contends that, if he had heard about the hearing, he would have shown up
for it, because his asylum application remained pending then. But that contention too is
unpersuasive, given that Ramos did nothing to follow up on that application for more than 13
years. Cf. Ba v. Holder, 561 F.3d 604, 607–08 (6th Cir. 2009). Nor is the presumption rebutted
by the mere fact that Ramos filed a motion to reopen within four months of learning of his removal
order in 2017. The Board therefore had good reason to conclude that Ramos received the notice
to appear at his 2003 hearing. And Ramos cannot complain that he did not receive notice of his
2004 hearing (at which he was actually ordered removed in absentia), given that he failed to notify
the immigration court of his new address in Canton. See 8 U.S.C. §§ 1229(a)(2)(B),
1229a(b)(5)(B).
Ramos separately argues that exceptional circumstances excused his failure to appear. See
id. § 1229a(b)(5)(C)(i). Exceptional circumstances are “matters ‘beyond the control of the alien,’
including ‘serious illness of the alien or serious illness or death of the spouse, child, or parent of
the alien, but not including less compelling circumstances.’” Denko v. INS, 351 F.3d 717, 723
(6th Cir. 2003) (quoting 8 U.S.C. § 1229a(e)(1)).
Here, Ramos cites three circumstances that he says are exceptional. First, he says he was
attacked by gang members in April 2003, which purportedly caused him to move to Canton that
June. But Ramos nowhere explains why he could not attend a hearing two months after the alleged
attack. Second, Ramos says he was too busy to attend his hearings, because he was caring for his
daughter. But his daughter was born in 2005, a year after the hearing at which he was ordered
removed. Finally, Ramos’s asserted need to support his family is a commonplace circumstance
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rather than an exceptional one. The Board did not abuse its discretion when it denied Ramos’s
motion to reopen his removal proceedings.
The petition is denied.
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