Honduran Jorge Alfredo Barralaga, 'Jorgito' as his loved ones called him, was forced to leave his country when he was only 22 years old.
He decided to emigrate to the United States because in Guanaja, an island in Honduras, he could not find work.
“In seeking a better life, he found death,
” his mother, Zulma Herrera, told Noticias Telemundo to Noticias Telemundo.
Barralaga is one of 10 migrants - six Hondurans, three Mexicans and one Guatemalan - who lost their lives when the white Ford pickup in which 30 were traveling overturned. The accident occurred when the driver tried to make a speeding turn on a highway next to the border, near the town of Encino.
Before embarking on his trip, the young man told his mother that he loved her and that was why he was leaving:
"I was tired of seeing me work so much,"
according to the woman who is dedicated to selling bullets, a typical Honduran dish made with flour tortillas and beans.
"He told me: Mommy, when I arrive he will lack nothing."
From left to right, he and José Alfredo Barralaga's sister, his mother, Zulma Herrera. Courtesy
"When I arrive you will no longer have to work and kill yourself working. I will build a house for you and start a business for you and my sister to be well and not suffer from poverty," he told her before leaving.
Barralaga struggled to study high school in Colón, where he lived with his paternal grandmother.
But when he returned to the island, he was unable to find a job.
That and the poor health of his parents motivated him to seek a better life in the United States.
"He loved us and just wanted to give us the best. He
was excited because he was going to arrive and start working to help us," the woman continued.
Her son was a very loving boy to her and the townspeople.
"We did not think that he would come to lose his life": the uncle of an accident victim in Texas speaks
Aug. 6, 202101: 14
"The truth is that in Honduras
life is very critical
for you, definitely very critical. You look for work and cannot find. Sometimes you study for nothing," said Hilton Ferrera, the deceased's uncle.
He learned of the accident through José's sister, a migrant, who survived the accident and preferred not to give her real name for fear of reprisals.
"
(He called me) to tell me that my nephew was dead,
" Ferrera said.
[The driver of the van in which 10 immigrants died in Texas turned too fast and hit a pole]
After the accident, the uncertainty was long for the relatives: it took more than 48 hours for the Honduran consulate in McAllen to attend to them and confirm that Jorge was among the 10 deceased.
And they still don't know where the body is.
“We have been calling the consulate but the phone always sounds busy.
When we get to the page it says that it is closed ”, he assures.
Like him, several Honduran families say it has been impossible to speak with the Honduran consulate in McAllen.
But from Honduras, the Foreign Ministry confirmed to Noticias Telemundo that it spoke with four of the six families with dead compatriots.
Seven other Hondurans were also injured.
The difficult repatriation of the body
After the tragedy, Herrera has only one wish: to
have her son's body back
.
"I just want to bring the body of my son. I want to say goodbye," he said.
But with the family in debt, Herrera does not know how the body will be repatriated.
"We don't have money for that, to be able to bring it here," he
said.
In order to raise funds and have the young man return to Honduras, relatives have created a GoFundMe page.
And for relatives living in the United States, mourning is even more bitter because, being undocumented, they
do not dare to search for the body.
Jorge Alfredo Barralaga, a Honduran migrant who his family believes was killed in a truck crash in Encino, Texas;
on August 4, 2021 Courtesy
“We don't have documents,
we don't have papers to be able to go find our nephew.
That is our helplessness.
Our family in Honduras talks to us and asks us what we know, ”the uncle said between sobs on Friday morning, before the consular authorities confirmed the tragic news.
Kidnapped in Mexico
Barralaga not only had to escape poverty, in Mexico he fled from a safe house where he was held hostage for more than three months.
This is how she met José.
In order for them to be released, their relatives in the United States had to pay around $ 5,000 for each one.
And even so, says the uncle, they had to escape after more than three months in captivity because the kidnappers would not let them go.
"Nowhere have we obtained peace because in Honduras it's the same, because of crime, poverty, you can't live, that's why it's time to emigrate here," says Ferrera.
The journalist Damià Bonmati conducted the interview that was used to write this text.