Agreda-Portillo

MEMORANDUM **

Jose Mauricio Agreda-Portillo (“Agreda-Portillo”), a native and citizen of El Salvador, petitions for review of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ (“BIA”) decision, affirming the Immigration Judge’s (“IJ”) denial of his application for asylum and withholding of deportation pursuant to INA §§ 208(a) and 241(b)(3)(A). We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252 (a)(1), and we deny the petition for review.

Agreda-Portillo claims that he was persecuted by members of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (“FMLN”) because of his membership in the El Salvadoran army. In 1992, the FMLN interrogated his uncle, Eleduvin *520 Ramos (“Ramos”), as to Agreda-Portillo’s whereabouts. Six months later,- Ramos was shot to death outside his home. A man was arrested for the crime, pleaded guilty, and is currently serving a life sentence. In 1993, after Agreda-Portillo had completed his military service, several men came to his home, identified themselves as members of the FMLN, and asked him to open the door. Agreda-Portillo believed that the men intended to kill him, and he fled his home. He later left El Salvador and entered the United States. Subsequently, he received word…

dissenting.

I dissent from the majority’s denial of Agreda-Portillo’s petition for review and regret our failure to treat his asylum claim the same way we treated a number of others in more reasonable times. The petitioner’s credible and uncontradicted testimony, like the testimony of others whose denials of asylum we have frequently overturned, is sufficient to establish a well-founded fear of persecution under Ninth Circuit law. See, e.g., Molina v. INS, 170 F.3d 1247, 1249 (9th Cir.1999) (holding that notes given to petitioner that say guerrillas want to speak to her establish well-founded fear of persecution); Aguilera-Cota v. INS, 914 F.2d 1375, 1379-80 (9th Cir.1990) (holding that anonymous note telling the petitioner to quit his government job, along with the questioning of his sister on his whereabouts, were sufficient to establish well-founded fear of persecution); Artiga Turcios v. INS, 829 F.2d 720, 723 (9th Cir.1987) (holding that fact that guerrillas were looking for petitioner, a former member of El Salvadoran army, was sufficient to satisfy a well-founded fear of persecution; it did not matter that petitioner and guerrillas did not meet face to face);…