Jazmín Lema, an Ecuadorian woman who allegedly escaped the violence of her daughter's father, died in the Mexican desert of Sonora.
Lema dreamed of reuniting with her mother who lives in New York
and was accompanied by her current partner and her 3-year-old daughter, who are in Mexican shelters.
The body of Lema, 21, remains in Mexico
while his family asked the Ecuadorian Foreign Ministry for help in transferring him to their country
for burial, said William Murillo, executive director of 1-800-Migrante, the group of lawyers who are assisting Gladys Guallpa, the young woman's mother.
According to Murillo, although the Ecuadorian government had said that the process could take a month, it is already facilitating repatriation assistance.
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"The mother lives in Queens, New York,
but Jazmín has a sister, grandmother and cousins who will see to it that the body is sent to Ecuador,
" he said.
The group contacted other lawyers at the border to arrange for Lema's daughter to enter the United States and meet with Guallpa, and they also notified the Mexican Human Rights Commission to verify that the girl is well.
They also analyze how to help
Lema's boyfriend, 17, who only has his godmother in the United States.
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The lawyers could ask for asylum for the young man and the girl, who are not identified because they are minors, although it is a fight against time because the father would be making arrangements in Ecuador to go to Mexico and claim the girl.
According to Murillo, nothing prevents the father from having custody of the minor - who is also claimed by her grandmother in New York - because her mother has died.
“
The grandparents are already making arrangements to take the girl to Ecuador.
We are against time and obviously that the father has more rights than the grandmother, "he recalled.
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Lema left with her daughter and her boyfriend on August 21 for Mexico to travel to the United States from there. According to the lawyers,
the minor's father signed the authorization to leave the country in exchange for not having to pay child support.
After arriving in Mexico, they traveled by bus to Guadalajara and there they took another transport to reach Tijuana, on the border with the United States.
But they were unable to complete that trip because they had to leave the bus due to immigration control and continued the journey on foot through the Sonoran desert, without water or food, with very high temperatures, which caused
Lema to faint and begin to bleed. by the nose.
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The young man who accompanied her carried Lema and the girl but could not continue the journey so he had to leave her and seek help. Murillo indicated.
"Do not abandon my daughter, take her to where Mommy is in Queens,"
the young woman asked her partner, according to the lawyer.
When he arrived in Sonora, the young man asked for help from a policeman who told him that it was a matter of medical emergency personnel, which delayed the help, according to 1-800-Migrante.
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When they finally returned,
Lema had died,
Murillo said.
Jasmine's dream was to be a teacher and she prepared to sit for the university entrance exam, but in the face of the economic crisis, she decided to leave her country.
Jéssica Lema, the young woman's sister, said in an interview with the newspaper El Comercio that Jazmín hired a coyote to help her cross the border.
The young woman says that her sister sent her text messages saying that she was fine and, the only mishap was that the girl vomited and that is why she only ate fruits, but then she got better.
According to Lema, the coyote told his sister that if he was traveling with children it was easier to enter the United States and the plan was to take them by bus to the closest point of the border where they would run 10 minutes to surrender to the US authorities.
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"The coyote had told him that this is the way they are supposedly crossing at this time," says Lema.
“The minors (the girl and the boyfriend) are in shelters in Sonora, Hermosillo.
We are working with human rights organizations to find out how their situation is and with lawyers in the United States
to explore the possibility that they can enter the country,
”said Murillo.
Lema's boyfriend notified his partner's mother what happened and she contacted the lawyers, who are now awaiting the paperwork carried out by their colleagues on the border and the response of the Human Rights Commission.
With information from EFE and El Comercio