Victims of Illegal Alien Crime Given a Voice: ‘Every One of Our Children’s Deaths Have Been Preventable’

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Michelle Moons
Washington, D.C.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — A diverse group of Americans whose loved ones are dead by the hands of illegal alien criminals had the opportunity to tell their stories in front of cameras from inside the White House just days ago when President Donald Trump honored them at a roundtable event.

Kate’s Law and the No Sanctuary for Criminals Act passed the U.S. House last week with the full Davis-Oliver Act still waiting for a vote. Davis-Oliver would enhance the ability of the federal government and immigration authorities to enforce immigration law and crack down on sanctuary cities. Kate’s Law and No Sanctuary for Criminals are portions of Davis-Oliver. These bills were discussed at the White House meeting but got scarce coverage in the mainstream media, a phenomena these “Angel” families have experienced for years.

Trump dedicated his most recent weekly address to these families. The President pointed out that many of those responsible for killing these Americans have extensive criminal records and had been repeatedly deported, yet were in the U.S. at the time of taking an American life.

“If the government had simply enforced our immigration laws, these Americans would still be alive today,” said Trump. He spoke of two bills passed this week in the House and called for the U.S. Senate to vote on them and get them to his desk for signing “as soon as possible.” He thanked Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte for moving the bills forward, while referencing “other crucial legislation that will soon be considered as well.” This likely includes the Davis-Oliver Act.

Trump called on members of both parties to stand with these victims of illegal alien crime, “either vote to save and protect American lives or vote to shield and comfort criminal aliens who threaten innocent lives, and they’ve been shielded too long.”

“The foundation of freedom is rule of law,” said Trump who looked forward to the 4th of July, Independence Day. He asked Americans to remember those families who have an “empty seat at the table this year” and asked all to pledge to “protect, defend, and save American lives.”

Trump asked the families to tell their stories as the clicks of cameras could be heard in the background.

Sitting next to Trump was Jamiel Shaw Sr. Shaw told of the murder of his teenage son Jamiel Shaw Jr. “He was living the dream. That was our dream, ya know. And it was squashed out.”

Shaw Jr. was killed in 2008 by an illegal alien gang member who had been released from jail just the day before, according to reports from the L.A. Times and MyFOXLA, as documented on michellemalkin.com. Shaw Sr. heard the shot from his house when criminal alien Pedro Espinoza gunned down Shaw Jr. The senior Shaw has previously recounted the prosecutor’s argument that his son was killed for the color of his skin and the color of his red Spiderman backpack. Espinoza was sentenced to death in 2012 for the crime.

Julie Golvach spoke of her son Spencer Golvach who was shot and killed in January 2015 while sitting in his vehicle waiting for a spotlight to change. The illegal alien who killed Spencer had been deported multiple times before he murdered the 25-year-old young man and another man in a shooting spree. He wounded three police officers before a Harris County sheriff’s deputy shot and killed him, according to the Texas Tribune.

Golvach told the room and cameras:

We’ve lost everything. He was my only child. I want some action. If this would have been done years ago, my son would still be here. This is not anything you want anybody to ever go through. I want some action…I don’t want anybody else to feel what we have to feel.

Spencer’s father Dan Golvach added, “This is what some politicians in the country have decided is acceptable for us. It’s not acceptable.”

Mary Ann Mendoza lost her son Sgt. Brandon Mendoza of the Mesa police department when an illegal alien, drunk to three times the legal limit and high on meth, drove the wrong way on a highway and hit and killed Brandon. The individual also perished as a result of the crash. “I’m tired of our politicians not caring about their fellow Americans,” said Mendoza. “When did it ever become more important to our elected officials to protect illegal criminals in our country and not care about us?”

Melissa Oliver spoke of losing her father, Sacramento sheriff’s Deputy Sheriff Danny Oliver, and the illegal alien who had been deported twice before killing him and had a criminal record. “This senseless crime has affected my family in many ways that are unexplainable, the pain is tremendous, and it’s something we’ll never get over.”

Oliver stressed the importance of passing the Davis-Oliver Act, “We need our law enforcement officers to have more information about these people that are in our country illegally and so we can go ahead and get them detained and so this can’t happen to another family.”

The Act is named for Sheriff Oliver and Placer County sheriff’s Detective Michael Davis. A criminal alien has been charge with shooting and killing Oliver, then taking off with his own wife before being confronted by Davis and another Deputy. He has admitted to shooting both, killing Davis and wounding the other. The offender, Marcelo Marquez, was arraigned in October 2014 for the crimes.

Fox40 interviewed Marquez from behind bars. The reporter said that he smiled the entire time and that his first words were that he knew he was famous. He admitted to planning to kill three people, but not law enforcement. He has several aliases and obtained false identification after crossing the border. Asked what led him to California, he said his wife was cheating with his brother and a couple from Craigslist and he planned to kill the brother and couple. He had stolen firearms and said he fired at law enforcement in fear of being arrested, though he claimed he didn’t kill both officers. He admitted to having used drugs in the past and being involved in a Mexican drug cartel.

Michelle Wilson-Root’s daughter Sarah Root was killed shortly after graduating from college. Root recounted for a Congressional committee that the illegal alien was street racing while drunk to allegedly four times the legal limit when he rear-ended Sarah’s vehicle and killed her. Edwin Mejia spent only four days in jail before posting bail and taking off on the run. He was believed to have fled back to Honduras. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement added Mejia to it’s “Most Wanted” list in March of this year.

Root said at the White House meeting:

Why do we have to encounter any type of violence and, I’m sorry, these laws that are trying to be passed, most of them are common sense. And until this happened to me, I thought this is what was in place. And to find out that it wasn’t terrifying to me. And I am telling you, these congressmen and Senators that don’t vote for these laws, the blood is on their hands for the next victim and that victim’s family.

Legal immigrant Sabine Durden shared the story of her son Dominic who was killed by an illegal alien who had been twice convicted of driving drunk. The illegally present Guatemalan national was given just 90 days in jail.

“I did it the right way. I came here knowing I wanted to be here. I had to go through certain steps so I did that and I’m a proud citizen now. And I had one child, my son Dominic, I brought him with me,” said Durden as she held up a very small urn that held some of Dominic’s ashes. “That’s all I got.”

Durden spoke of wanting to commit suicide before hearing Trump speak the words “illegal immigration” during his June 16 campaign announcement, “I was walking through my living room and I dropped to my knees. Cause it was my little sign from God, you not doing anything, you stay around.” A short time later Trump met with a group of Angel families, including Durden, in Los Angeles. She continued, “You were the only one that ever met with us and became our voice.”

Steve Ronnebeck lost his son Grant when an illegal alien came into the convenience store where Grant worked and shot and killed the 21-year-old young man. In 2015, Ronnebeck told Breitbart News, “The man pulled a gun, Grant offered up the cigarettes and the man executed him, shooting him in the face. Stepped over his body, grabbed two more packs of cigarettes and fled.” Grant’s killer is a self-professed member of the Sinaloa cartel. The alien had a criminal background including burglary, which Ronnebeck has said was pleaded down from home invasion and a week-long sexual assault.

“Every one of our children’s deaths have been preventable,” Ronnebeck said at the White House meeting. “I don’t think I would wish the devastation that we’ve felt every day, on anyone.”

The individual charged with killing Grant Ronnebeck is set to go on trial in September of this year, according to the Toronto Sun. Apolinar Altamirano faces the death penalty if convicted.

Juan Pina told the story of his 14-year-old daughter Christy Sue Pina who was “strangled, stabbed, raped, sodomized. Her nude body was thrown in an artichoke field in the middle of winter” in 1990. The field was in Castroville, California. Accused killer Arsenio “Archie” Leyva fled to Mexico again and has been fighting extradition since he was found there in 2015.

Leyva had previously kidnapped and tortured another 14-year-old girl in 1987, recounted Pina. He got out of jail on $50,000 bail after paying $5,000. “He got out, went back to Mexico, this is in July of ’87,” Pina added.

Pina said the criminal alien returned in September and kidnapped, “did the same thing,” possibly worse, to another girl. He was jailed, but that was just “another slap on the arm,” said Pina. Then he returned to Mexico. The Californian reported that the offender, Arsenio Pacheco Leyva, raped both girls in 1987 with a foreign object, according to court documents, and got 300 days in jail and three years probation for those crimes.

“Came back in ’90. February the 8th they found my daughter out there in the artichoke field,” said Pina, who added that the alien wasn’t caught then and took off. The criminal alien would later attempt to kidnap a 12-year-old on her way to school.

Pina went on to give an account of troubles with the District Attorney’s office and being told to keep quiet about what happened to his daughter:

I’ve gone round and round with the District Attorney there in our county and we don’t see eye to eye on a lot of stuff. They wanted me to keep my mouth shut about a lot of things, but I don’t. I’m my daughter’s voice. And what I think that we’re, Mr. President here is trying to do is the best thing ever and if you need a pen with a lot of ink, I’ve got one of those too. And I’m all for everything that you’re doing.

Gotta put our people safe, just like they said over there. They protect them and that’s not right. Americans First. Americans First. We gotta get all these bills that he wants passed. Gotta get ‘em passed. Soon. Not later. Now.

Laura Wilkerson recounted the killing of her 18-year-old son Joshua. “In November of 2010, he was systematically tortured, brutally beaten, murdered, and then his body set on fire after death. From somebody who shouldn’t have been in this country. Josh was a good kid.” Wilkerson said he was about to graduate from high school and had aspirations of joining the Air Force as his older brother had.

“He was very kind, soft spoken, compassionate. He was giving this kid a ride home, which is something we taught him to do, to show compassion for other people and that’s what he was doing, and this kid intentionally murdered him and set him on fire because he wanted Joshua’s truck,” said Wilkerson. “This is not about politics, it is about safety,” she said, emphasizing that “both parties should be on board with this.”

Belize national Hermilo Moralez confessed to the murder and was sentenced to life in prison in 2013. He would be eligible for parole after 30 years, according to the Houston Chronicle. Moralez had been previously arrested for stalking his ex-girlfriend. He was jailed less than five months before murdering Joshua Wilkerson.

A day ahead of last week’s meeting with Trump, several of the Angel families announced the new Angel-family led group Advocates for Victims of Illegal Alien Crime. Rep. Steve King joined the families for the announcement as he heralded the new group and plans to work with them to see America’s immigration laws enforced. King also called for a concrete wall along the U.S. southern border. Breitbart News live streamed the entire announcement.

In July 2014, Durden and her fiancé, Anthony Coulter, spoke with Breitbart News in the middle of clashing illegal immigration protests in Murrieta, California. As a minority himself, Coulter asked, “Who speaks for me?” as he held up a sign declaring that “illegal” is not a racial word. In a video of his statement, Duden is standing by his side holding up the image of her son Dominic. Coulter says he is speaking for Duden’s half-black son Dominic.

In July 2015, Donald Trump met with several families whose loved ones had been killed, and afterward he held a press conference. With a host of media outlets gathered there in Los Angeles, he spoke briefly before handing the podium over the families, allowing them to tell their own stories. Durden, Shaw, Don Rosenberg, Lupe Moreno, and Brenda Sparks were all present at the meeting. Each has lost a child or nephew due to criminal aliens.

Each of those who participated in the July 2015 meeting told their stories before being included at the National Day of Remembrance for Americans killed by illegal aliens.

Breitbart News reported on The National Day of Remembrance event in November 2014 and again in 2015 after the Trump press conference. Despite organizers’ statement in 2015 to Breitbart News that they had informed several media outlets, no other media outlet showed up.

On Thursday, the U.S. House of Representatives passed Kate’s Law, named for criminal alien victim Kate Steinle, and the No Sanctuary for Criminals Act which includes Grant’s Law and Sarah’s Law. Grant’s Law is named for Grant Ronnebeck and Sarah’s Law is named for Sarah Root. The future of the bills as they move on to the U.S. Senate is uncertain. Many continue to hope that the House will pass the substantial Davis-Oliver Act, which despite the passage of these other laws, is still waiting for a vote.

On the day last week that these two bills passed the House, the “Big Three” television networks — ABC, CBS, and NBC — dedicated a massive 12 minutes and 14 seconds to Trump’s tweets about MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski, yet only NBC’s Lester Holt covered passage of the two bills and even then only gave it 26-seconds, according to NewsBusters. Fox News did report that both bills passed with some measure of bipartisan support.

Follow Michelle Moons on Twitter @MichelleDiana 

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