Andrade v. Bondi — CAT Remand Required When the Agency Overlooks Evidence of Systemic Prison Torture and Intentional Deprivations

Introduction

In Andrade v. Bondi (2d Cir. Jan. 16, 2026) (summary order), the Second Circuit granted a petition for review, vacated a removal order, and remanded a denial of protection under the Convention Against Torture (“CAT”). The petitioner, Jorge Alberto Andrade, is a native and citizen of El Salvador who sought CAT relief based on the near-certain likelihood of detention under El Salvador’s “régimen de excepción” (state of exception) and the asserted risk of torture in Salvadoran custody—through direct abuse by prison officials and through prison conditions alleged to be intentionally imposed to inflict severe suffering.

The central issues were whether the agency (IJ and BIA) (i) properly evaluated extensive country-conditions evidence bearing on the likelihood of intentional torture by prison officials, (ii) properly assessed whether severe prison conditions reflected the “specific intent” required for CAT torture when conditions are framed as “lawful sanctions,” and (iii) correctly rejected an additional theory of harm—torture by rival gang members—with government acquiescence.

Although the disposition is a nonprecedential summary order, it meaningfully illustrates the Second Circuit’s ongoing insistence that CAT adjudications engage with material record evidence and apply the “aggregate risk” framework in a reviewable way.

Summary of the Opinion

The Second Circuit reviewed the IJ’s decision as supplemented by the BIA (Yan Chen v. Gonzales) and applied substantial-evidence review to factual findings and de novo review to questions of law and law-to-fact applications (Quintanilla-Mejia v. Garland), mindful that administrative factual findings are conclusive unless a reasonable adjudicator would be compelled to conclude otherwise (8 U.S.C. § 1252(b)(4)(B)).

The Court held that remand was required because the agency did not address key evidence relevant to (i) whether torture by Salvadoran prison officials was systemic rather than “anecdotal,” and (ii) whether harsh prison conditions (including overcrowding and deprivation of food and water) were intentionally imposed so as to qualify as torture under CAT. The Court did not decide that Andrade met the CAT standard, but directed the agency to reassess the record under the proper “totality/aggregate risk” approach.

The Court found no error in the agency’s rejection of Andrade’s claim that he would be tortured by rival gang members in prison with official “acquiescence,” because the record reflected efforts to separate rival gangs and lacked evidence supporting government tolerance of inter-gang torture.

Analysis

Precedents Cited

  • Yan Chen v. Gonzales — Provided the review posture: the Second Circuit reviews the IJ decision as supplemented by the BIA. This matters because the Court assessed gaps in both the IJ’s and BIA’s treatment of evidence.
  • Quintanilla-Mejia v. Garland — Anchored the standards of review: substantial evidence for facts, de novo for legal questions and law-to-fact application. The remand here was driven less by a direct factual reversal and more by legal error in evidentiary engagement and reviewability.
  • Xiao Ji Chen v. U.S. Dep't of Just. — The agency is presumed to have considered all evidence unless the record compellingly suggests otherwise. The Court relied on this presumption as a starting point, but found it overcome by concrete omissions and mischaracterizations.
  • Doe v. Sessions — Central to the remand rationale: remand is warranted when the agency overlooks key evidence or mischaracterizes the record. The Court invoked Doe repeatedly to frame the agency’s failure to grapple with evidence pointing to state policy, impunity, and intentionality.
  • Poradisova v. Gonzales — Supported remand where the agency’s reasoning is insufficient for judicial review. Here, the Court found the agency’s “anecdotal/speculative” framing too thin given the contrary record.
  • Chun Gao v. Gonzales — Clarified the “more likely than not” burden as “greater than a fifty percent chance.” The Court did not decide that the threshold was met, but held the agency must reassess likelihood based on the full evidentiary picture.
  • Matter of J-R-G-P- — Supplied two governing CAT principles the Court enforced: (i) likelihood must be considered as the aggregate risk of torture from all sources, and (ii) prison-conditions CAT claims require attention to intentionality, not merely harshness.
  • Pierre v. Gonzales — Provided the doctrinal framework for prison conditions: barbaric conditions may constitute torture if severe pain/suffering is inflicted with illicit intent; deficits in diet, hygiene, and space are not torture unless sufficiently extreme and intentionally inflicted rather than attributable to poverty, neglect, or incompetence. The Court used Pierre to evaluate “specific intent” evidence and the “lawful sanctions” exception.
  • Galina v. Wilkinson — Offered a contrasting example where solitary confinement served a legitimate penological purpose. The Court used Galina to highlight the absence, on this record, of a legitimate penological justification for extreme arbitrariness (e.g., electric shocks, strangulation, lethal beatings), reinforcing why such conduct fits CAT’s torture concept when intentional.
  • Villalta Martinez v. Bondi — Especially important to the Court’s evidentiary critique: the BIA errs when it relies on incomplete information about prison conditions to deny or undo a torture finding where there is evidence of data suppression. The Court analogized: limitations on prison access and alleged cover-ups can increase, not decrease, concern about torture likelihood.
  • Jian Hui Shao v. Mukasey — Confirmed that while the agency must consider relevant evidence, it need not parse or refute every argument or piece of evidence. The Court used this to uphold the agency’s handling of the rival-gang theory as unsupported/speculative.

Legal Reasoning

1) Torture by prison officials: the agency could not discount the record as “anecdotal” without confronting systemic evidence

CAT torture requires intentional infliction of severe pain or suffering by, or with the consent/acquiescence of, a public official acting in an official capacity (8 C.F.R. § 1208.18(a)(1)). The Court treated the “state action” element as straightforward for abuse by prison guards and police, who are public officials.

The dispute was likelihood: whether Andrade showed it was “more likely than not” that he would be tortured if detained. The agency deemed the risk “speculative,” characterizing record evidence as “anecdotal.” The Court held that this assessment was not adequately reasoned because the agency failed to address key evidence suggesting systemic, state-sanctioned torture—particularly the expert affidavit stating that extreme violence is “a matter of state-sanctioned policy and practice,” alongside reports of deaths in custody with indicia of torture and accounts of electric shocks, humiliation, isolation, starvation, and beatings.

The Court further faulted the agency’s implicit reliance on incomplete visibility into prison practices: where the record reflects restricted access, limited data, and concealment, the lack of comprehensive information cannot be used simplistically against the CAT applicant—an approach the Court linked to Villalta Martinez v. Bondi.

Finally, the Court highlighted a specific omission undermining the agency’s “credible steps” narrative: while the IJ cited a State Department report for steps to punish officials, the agency failed to acknowledge the same report’s statement that “Impunity was a problem ... particularly for prison guards” and that authorities had not opened complaints into allegations of torture/abuse by guards. Under Doe v. Sessions, ignoring contrary evidence that goes to the heart of the likelihood analysis warrants remand.

2) Prison conditions: the agency had to engage with evidence of “specific intent” to inflict suffering

Conditions-based CAT claims require careful separation of (i) severe suffering arising “only from, inherent in, or incidental to lawful sanctions” from (ii) sanctions or conditions that “defeat the object and purpose” of CAT (8 C.F.R. § 1208.18(a)(3)). Under Pierre v. Gonzales, barbaric prison conditions can be torture if they cause severe pain or suffering and are imposed with illicit intent; by contrast, poor conditions from poverty, neglect, or incompetence generally do not satisfy CAT absent evidence of intentional infliction.

Here, the IJ found imprisonment nearly certain and conditions “cruel, inhuman, and degrading,” but concluded Andrade produced no evidence that conditions were intended to cause pain and suffering. The Second Circuit held this was inadequately supported because the record contained evidence from which intent could be inferred, including (i) official promotion of overcrowded and inadequate food as “appropriate treatment” for suspected gang members, (ii) government awareness of extreme overcrowding as detainee numbers surged, (iii) evidence of severe food and water deprivation, and (iv) presidential statements threatening to stop feeding prisoners. The Court concluded these materials were not meaningfully addressed by the IJ and were likewise not addressed by the BIA on appeal, despite Andrade’s arguments.

The Court also criticized the BIA’s framing of this evidence as “generalized reports” of ordinary prison brutality—finding that characterization inconsistent with the record’s emphasis on severity, official messaging, and a punitive posture toward detainees under the state of exception. Because Matter of J-R-G-P- requires assessment of the aggregate risk of torture, the Court instructed the agency to determine whether intentional violence by officials and intentionally punitive conditions together push the likelihood above the “more likely than not” threshold.

3) Rival gang-member violence: acquiescence was not shown on this record

Torture by private actors can satisfy CAT if officials consent or acquiesce; acquiescence requires prior awareness and breach of duty to intervene, including willful blindness (8 C.F.R. § 1208.18(a)(7)). The Court upheld denial of this theory because the record reflected efforts to separate rival gangs and lacked evidence that prison officials condoned inter-gang torture. Invoking Jian Hui Shao v. Mukasey, the Court emphasized the agency need not address every claim at length when it lacks evidentiary support.

Impact

This decision’s practical significance lies in the Court’s insistence on record-responsive CAT adjudication in “state of exception” El Salvador cases: an IJ/BIA cannot (i) label evidence “anecdotal” without engaging with expert opinions and multi-source reporting that supports systemic abuse, (ii) treat government opacity as a neutral absence of proof when the record indicates access restrictions and concealment, or (iii) reject conditions-based torture claims without grappling with circumstantial evidence of “specific intent,” including official publicity and rhetoric embracing deprivation as punishment.

Doctrinally, the order reinforces three themes likely to shape litigation strategies even in nonprecedential form: (1) Matter of J-R-G-P-’s “aggregate risk” requirement is not optional; (2) Pierre v. Gonzales does not bar prison-conditions CAT claims when intent can be inferred from state policy and messaging; and (3) under Doe v. Sessions and Poradisova v. Gonzales, omissions and mischaracterizations that prevent meaningful review trigger remand.

Complex Concepts Simplified

  • CAT protection (Convention Against Torture): A form of relief that blocks removal if the person shows it is “more likely than not” (i.e., >50%) they will be tortured in the destination country.
  • “More likely than not”: Not certainty—just a probability greater than 50% (Chun Gao v. Gonzales).
  • State action / official capacity: Torture must involve public officials (or be attributable to them). Abuse by prison guards typically satisfies this because guards are government actors.
  • Acquiescence: For private-actor torture, a CAT applicant must show officials knew (or were willfully blind) and then failed to intervene (8 C.F.R. § 1208.18(a)(7)).
  • Specific intent (in prison-conditions cases): Under Pierre v. Gonzales, harsh conditions are not “torture” unless they are intentionally imposed to cause severe suffering (or for illicit purposes like punishment, coercion, intimidation), rather than stemming from neglect or poverty.
  • Aggregate risk: The adjudicator must consider the combined risk from all torture sources, not compartmentalize them into separate “divisible” claims (Matter of J-R-G-P-).
  • Why “remand” matters: The Court did not grant CAT relief outright; it required the agency to redo the analysis correctly, considering key evidence and producing reasoning that permits judicial review (Poradisova v. Gonzales).

Conclusion

Andrade v. Bondi vacates and remands a CAT denial because the agency’s analysis did not adequately confront evidence suggesting systemic, state-linked torture in Salvadoran prisons during the state of exception and did not meaningfully evaluate circumstantial evidence that extreme prison conditions were intentionally imposed as punishment. The Second Circuit’s order underscores that CAT decisions must engage with the full country-conditions record, assess intent where prison conditions are alleged to be torturous, and evaluate likelihood using an aggregate-risk framework. At the same time, the Court confirmed that unsupported theories—such as rival-gang torture without evidence of official acquiescence—may be rejected as speculative.

Note: The Court designated this disposition as a “SUMMARY ORDER” and stated it “DO[ES] NOT HAVE PRECEDENTIAL EFFECT,” though it remains citable under the rules identified in the order.