Gang violence in Mexico is a major factor in people immigrating to the United States, when Juan Coronilla-Guerrero showed up to his second court date on the charges of marijuana possession and family violence, he told the judge that deportation to Mexico would definitely kill him and most, unfortunately, it did.
Two weeks ago, just four days before Mexican Independence day, four men irrupted into Coronilla Guerrero’s house in San Luis de la Paz, Guanajuato looking for the 28-year-old father. The gunmen took Coronilla-Guerrero from his bedroom while he was sleeping beside his young son. The gang members jammed a pistol to his temple and violently took him away.
“I knew that if he came back here, they were going to kill him, and look, that’s what happened. That’s what happened.”” Coronilla-Guerrero’s wife told the Washington Post. “Don’t worry, my love. Don’t worry,” said Coronilla-Guerrero to his son before disappearing, according to the wife.
A week later, the man’s body was found on the side of a desolate road, 40 minutes away from the house where he had been staying with his wife and son in Central Mexico.
Three months ago, Coronilla-Guerrero and his family begged a federal judge not to throw him back over the border, the family told him that they came to the United States to escape the Mexican gangs that had already threatened his life before.
It’s true that Coronilla-Guerrero had been brought in over two misdemeanors. On March 3, the now deceased man was arrested at the Travis County Courthouse. Even though he had already been arrested and deported in 2008, Coronilla-Guerrero made the appearance in good faith to address the charges, one of which, the family violence charge, according to both he and his wife said t was a complete misunderstanding.
“He wanted to do the right thing and he appeared at his second court date, when he was leaving, immigration agents were waiting for him and took him. He didn’t even get to say goodbye to me, or to his son, because now we don’t even know where he is going to be.”
Coronilla-Guerrero’s wife told the Austin American-Statesman.
Apparently, observers were right to worry about ICE agents using the criminal justice system like a hunting ground for undocumented defendants. At the time of Coronilla’s arrest, this was the first time federal immigration agents had arrested someone in the local courthouse.
“This is a true tragedy for him and his family. Deportation should never be a death sentence.”
David Peterson, Coronilla-Guerrero’s attorney
As unfortunate as this is, may the case serve as a grim reminder of the life some immigrants flee from and what could happen to them if they cross ICE.