‘He didn’t deserve that’: widow speaks out after husband’s violent death at ICE facility

A few hours before the Texas sun set, Stephany Gauffeny held her newborn son close to her chest as she started walking in a cemetery. The grave she stopped at had no headstone, but Gauffeny, 32, had written her husband’s name on a red ribbon.

She married Miguel García-Hernández in 2016, nearly 10 years before he was shot at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Dallas in late September.

“I am trying to cope because that’s what I am supposed to do, but what hurts me the most is to hear my kids ask where daddy is,” said Gauffeny, speaking to the Guardian in her first interview since his death.

“My eight-year-old daughter with autism waited for him until the last minute. They would talk over the phone while he was detained, but one day before the funeral, I had to tell her that daddy was in heaven and that he would be watching her and that she wouldn’t see him.”

García-Hernández ended up in ICE custody early on 24 September after a short time in jail for a DUI. That same morning, while he was shackled inside a government van, a gunman opened fire outside the ICE field office in Dallas where he was awaiting intake.

View image in fullscreen Miguel García-Hernández with his wife, Stephany Gauffeny. Photograph: League of United Latin American Citizens

Federal authorities have said the attacker was targeting ICE officials, but only detainees were hurt, including García-Hernández, 31, who was rushed to the hospital in critical condition.

“I was coming back from a doctor’s appointment for my pregnancy and I was so excited to tell him about our son, but I got a call saying that my husband was in the hospital,” said Gauffeny, switching between English and Spanish intermittently.

“I walked into the [hospital] room and I just started crying. His arms were restrained to the bed and he had handcuffs on his feet.”

García-Hernández died on 29 September from his gunshot wounds. His third child with Gauffeny was born three days later. He would have turned 32 on 5 January, the day of their 10th wedding anniversary, Gauffeny said as she stood sorrowfully in front of García-Hernández’s grave.

She believes the rising political violence and anti-immigration agenda in the US played a part in her husband’s violent death.

The couple had been focusing hard on the new home they bought a few months ago in Arlington, on the outskirts of Dallas. There, they lived with their children, as well as two girls from Gauffeny’s previous relationship whom García-Hernández had helped raise.

“He talked about little projects like turning the garage into a room, painting some parts of the house, getting a new fence and doing it all by himself,” said Gauffeny, her voice cracking.

“It hurts to look around now, you know? Who is going to do it?”

García-Hernández was born in San Luis Potosí, a central state in Mexico, and crossed the US border without papers when he was 14. Though the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca) program has benefited hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants with similar cases since 2012, he arrived just too early to qualify.

García-Hernández lived in the Dallas area for nearly two decades, most recently making a living painting and remodeling homes. Gauffeny said he had applied for a Biden administration initiative, dubbed Keeping Families Together, that was designed to allow the undocumented spouses of US citizens to get legal status. However, a federal judge in Texas blocked the policy just a few months after it started.

View image in fullscreen Flowers at the gravesite of Miguel García-Hernández in Arlington, Texas. Photograph: Desiree Rios/The Guardian

Martina Alvarado, a lawyer who tried to help García-Hernández fix his immigration status, said he was awaiting a waiver that, if granted, would effectively erase his illegal entry into the US and allow him to get a green card based on his marriage to an American citizen.

Gauffeny said her husband was planning to open his own painting company as soon as his immigration case was resolved, and he had been saving money for the equipment.

Since Donald Trump took office for a second time, his administration has aggressively expanded immigration raids across the country, granting deportation agents a broad mandate to target those in the country without proper documents, even if they’re not criminals. The crackdown has spurred massive protests and growing concerns over tactics by federal agents.

The contentious climate around immigration under the Trump administration can also be palpable far from the neighborhoods and the streets where federal agents roam. After the shooting and the death of García-Hernández, Gauffeny said she received hateful messages from strangers on social media.

“Some comments said they were happy that it happened because he shouldn’t have been here illegally,” said Gauffeny.

“He and I never hid the fact he entered illegally, you know, but what I keep saying is that he didn’t deserve that and we’re going to fight this.”

Eric Cedillo, a Dallas attorney who has been helping Gauffeny since the shooting, said they are contemplating filing a lawsuit, without specifying details at that time.

García-Hernández’s mother, Maria García, was deported to Mexico earlier this year and was initially unable to see her son when he was hospitalized. But she was allowed into the US after the Mexican government intervened. In a statement, Mexico’s foreign ministry said “an extraordinary humanitarian parole was arranged for García-Hernández’s mother to travel to the US”.

The statement did not provide information on what, if any, economic assistance has or will be given to Gauffeny to cover expenses related to García-Hernández’s funeral.

View image in fullscreen Stephany Gauffeny, 32, visits the gravesite of her husband, Miguel García-Hernández, with their newborn baby, Miles Alexander García, in Arlington, Texas, on 15 October. Photograph: Desiree Rios/The Guardian

At the funeral, a Mexican flag was laid next to his grave by the Brown Berets of North Texas, a community defense group that runs an “ICE Watch” in the area. When Stephany visited with newborn Miles Alexander last week, the flag was gone but some roses remained.

Gauffeny said that securing the burial site was possible thanks to money donated to a GoFundMe page created by her sister-in-law. There is no headstone on García-Hernández’s grave yet because she cannot afford it.

“My biggest concern now is to have a place to live in the future. Our mortgage is very expensive and we were already struggling when he was detained. I am scared for my kids,” Gauffeny said.

Before leaving the cemetery in Arlington, Gauffeny recalled that her husband had bought a Bible in Spanish while in the custody of Tarrant county for the DUI. Days after his death, his belongings came in the mail, including the Bible, which he had bookmarked.

She said: “It was on a page in Genesis. He wanted to read the Bible from the start to the end but couldn’t continue because he was killed.”