Pachkov v. Canada ( Minister of Citizenship and Immigration )
IMM-2340-98
Teitelbaum J.
8/1/99
13 pp.
Application for judicial review of Immigration and Refugee Board decision determining applicant not Convention refugee-Applicant born in Latvia, of Russian nationality-Applicant alleged after turning down proposal by customer to distribute nationalist political party's pamphlets while working as garage mechanic, applicant and wife receiving written death threats telling applicant to leave job and Latvia-Applicant going to United States, returning to Latvia, then going back to United States-Parties' submissions relating to three main issues raised in Board's decision: (1) applicant's credibility, (2) presumption of State protection and (3) lack of well-founded fear of persecution-Whether Board erred in fact or in law such as to warrant Court's intervention-Court must determine whether, in assessing facts and finding applicant's story not credible, Board erred in having regard to applicant's failure to disclose garage incident in Personal Information Form (PIF) and lack of corroborative evidence applicant mechanic-Applicant established direct connection between pamphlet incident at garage and ensuing events-Board did not err in having regard to garage incident and to applicant's failure to mention incident in PIF-Facts in record and applicant's testimony do not suggest incident insignificant-Board considered all elements of applicant's story and did not make unreasonable finding on applicant's credibility in light of evidence in record-Board's credibility finding does not warrant Court's intervention-Applicant argued Board erred in finding applicant had not rebutted presumption of State protection owed to all citizens-Board assumed applicant Latvian citizen and imposed on applicant burden of rebutting presumption of State protection-Board made unreasonable error in assessment of facts by imposing obligation on applicant to rebut presumption of State protection under Immigration Act, s. 2(1)(a)(i)-Error significant error of law warranting Court's intervention-Application allowed-Immigration Act, R.S.C., 1985, c. I-2, s. 2(1) (as am. by R.S.C., 1985 (4th Supp.), c. 28, s. 1).