The Fifth Circuit has rejected an adverse credibility determination rendered by an Immigration Judge with a 99.5% denial rate, based on perceived similarities between the petitioner’s claim and other asylum claims. “Here, the IJ did not compare the petition to specific applications, instead orally describing an amalgam of applications that she had previously seen. Nor did the IJ identify’ a substantial number of instances where the same or remarkably similar language is used to describe the same kind of incident or encounter. As a result, Singh could not meaningfully compare the language and narratives, produce evidence to explain the similarities, or draw attention to important distinctions. A composite description provides only a distillation of several petitions and a glimpse into the mind of the IJ, an insufficient foundation for the fine-grained comparisons that are needed for inter-proceeding similarities to have probative value. For the same reasons, it precludes the BIA and appellate courts from engaging in the searching review that interproceeding similarities require.”
The full text of Singh v. Garland can be found here:
https://www.ca5.uscourts.gov/opinions/pub/19/19-60937-CV0.pdf