Background
Maikol Andrey Delgado Pinzon and Cindy Marcela Lopez Torres, both Colombian citizens, sought asylum in Canada in May 2022, claiming persecution by the FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia). Delgado Pinzon had been a police officer since 2006 and participated in multiple successful operations against FARC’s drug trafficking and weapons smuggling operations in various Colombian departments. In July 2021 and late 2021, he and his colleagues conducted operations that seized FARC weapons, ammunition, explosives, and cocaine, and arrested FARC members.
Following these operations, Delgado Pinzon began hearing rumors that FARC members wanted to kill police officers in the area. In early January 2022, he received messages from FARC members demanding his collaboration in exchange for “economic advantages,” which he refused. In February 2022, he discovered a funeral arrangement with threats at his apartment door. By March 2022, he received death threats via WhatsApp and threatening phone calls. He learned he had been declared a “military objective” by FARC. Despite reporting the threats to his superiors and the Attorney General’s office, he received no effective protection. The couple fled to the United States in late April 2022 and entered Canada one month later.
The Refugee Protection Division (SPR) held a hearing on September 19, 2024, and rejected their asylum claims on the basis that an Internal Relocation Alternative (IRA) existed in the cities of Cali, Medellín, and Cartagena, and that they had not demonstrated a serious possibility of persecution in those locations.
The Court’s Holding
Justice Gascon allowed the judicial review and annulled the SPR’s decision on grounds of unreasonableness. The Court identified two fundamental errors in the SPR’s reasoning. First, the SPR unreasonably drew a negative credibility inference against the applicants based merely on a formal omission. The applicants had not included in their initial asylum application form (FDA) allegations regarding suspicious individuals seen near their mother’s home in Bogotá. However, the applicants had submitted a letter from their mother’s neighbor describing “strange and suspicious vehicles and motorcycles searching for something or someone” as exhibit P-19 with their list of documents more than one year before the hearing. The SPR failed to even mention this letter in its decision, despite its critical relevance to the question of whether FARC remained interested in locating the applicants. The Court held that the prior submission of this evidence via the official exhibit list should have negated any credibility inference based on the FDA omission.
Second, the SPR committed a fundamental error in its Internal Relocation Alternative analysis by failing to adequately consider the applicants’ particular circumstances. The SPR’s analysis of the proposed IRA cities contained only generic discussion of displaced populations in Colombia generally, without any specific consideration of Delgado Pinzon’s profile as a police officer who had directly participated in operations that harmed FARC, the fact that he had been declared a “military objective,” or FARC’s documented tactics of directly targeting police officers. The SPR did not analyze either FARC’s motivation or capacity to pursue the applicants in the proposed relocation cities. The Court found that this omission rendered the SPR’s analysis unintelligible and unjustifiable, as the applicants’ profile differed substantially from the general Colombian population.
Key Takeaways
- An applicant’s failure to include allegations in the initial asylum application form is not fatal to credibility if the applicant has otherwise provided the information through other documentary means before the hearing, such as submitted exhibits with adequate notice to the decision-maker.
- In evaluating an Internal Relocation Alternative, a decision-maker must adequately and specifically consider the applicant’s particular profile and circumstances, including the specific characteristics and tactics of the persecuting group, rather than relying on general observations about displaced populations.
- A decision-maker’s failure to address crucial evidence that contradicts core aspects of the reasoning renders the decision unreasonable, even when there is a presumption that the decision-maker has considered all evidence.
- The analysis of both the motivation and capacity of persecuting agents to pursue an applicant in proposed relocation areas is essential to a proper Internal Relocation Alternative assessment.
Why It Matters
This decision reinforces important procedural and substantive protections for refugee claimants. It establishes that immigration decision-makers must engage meaningfully with all relevant documentary evidence, particularly evidence that undermines negative credibility findings. The judgment also clarifies that the Internal Relocation Alternative analysis cannot proceed in the abstract; it must be grounded in the specific realities of each applicant’s circumstances and the characteristics of the organization from which they fear persecution. For police officers and other public servants persecuted by armed groups, the decision confirms that their distinctive profile—having directly opposed or harmed the persecuting organization—must be central to evaluating whether relocation within the country of origin is viable.
The decision also signals the Federal Court’s vigilance against deficient reasons that leave applicants unable to understand the basis for adverse findings, particularly where formal omissions from initial application forms are penalized without consideration of information that has been otherwise communicated to the decision-maker well in advance of the hearing. The case will likely influence how immigration decision-makers assess credibility in the context of supplementary documentary evidence and how thoroughly they must tailor internal relocation analyses to applicants’ particular profiles and threat profiles.