RE VILLAREAL ESPERANZA VALDEZ

CAMP175/2019

[2021] HKCA 1197

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF APPEAL

MISCELLANEOUS PROCEEDINGS NO 175 OF 2019

(ON AN INTENDED APPEAL FROM HCAL 405/2018)

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J U D G M E N T

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Hon Barma JA (giving the Judgment of the Court):

1.  On 23 March 2021, this court (Poon CJHC and Barma JA) handed down a judgment dismissing the applicant’s application for extension of time to appeal against the decision of Deputy High Court Judge Josiah Lam (“the judge”) on 24 December 2018 refusing leave to the applicant to apply for judicial review. The applicant had sought to review the decision of the Torture Claims Appeal Board (“the Board”) dismissing her appeal from the decision of the Director of Immigration rejecting her non‑refoulement claim.

2.  The facts and issues in the application, as well as the court’s reasons for dismissing it, are set out in our judgment.[1] We will not repeat them here.

3.  The applicant subsequently applied, by a Notice of Motion filed on 30 March 2021, for leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal.  The applicant stated in the Notice of Motion that:

“I would like to inform the [court] that there is some error in law in my decision. Decision maker just relied on COI information and my previous facts which were in favor while rejecting my claim. Actual life occur different situation then what is mentioned in COI information. The Officer and courts prefers to ignore the overwhelming of the evidence of this violence towards minorities searching for unrealistic silver lining. The Decision is betray a bias and formula approach unlikely fairly access the danger of my life and clearly not reasonable.”

4.  Because the applicant failed to comply with the direction unless order made by the Registrar of Civil Appeals on 31 March 2021, the applicant was debarred from lodging any written submissions and the application was dealt with on paper on the basis of the materials already filed before the court.

5.  Having considered the applicant’s Notice of Motion, we see no reason to depart from the usual practice of determining an application of this kind on the papers. We have, therefore, determined the applicant’s application on the basis of the documents filed.

6.  The matters stated by the applicant do not constitute grounds for granting leave to appeal to the Court of Final Appeal.  The applicant has failed to identify any question of great general or public importance for the Court of Final Appeal to determine, as required by section 22(1)(b) of the Hong Kong Court of Final Appeal Ordinance, Cap 484.  Nor is any such question apparent to us from the matters she has raised.  

7.  The applicant’s unparticularised claim that the court ignored the overwhelming evidence of violence towards the minorities does not disclose any ground that is reasonably arguable before the Court of Final Appeal.

8.  We also do not see any basis for granting leave on the “otherwise” limb under section 22(1)(b).

9.  For these reasons, the Notice of Motion dated 30 March 2021 is dismissed.