Juan Jairo Coronilla Durán, a 28-year-old Mexican national, died July 14 after being struck by a tractor trailer in St. Augustine, Florida. According to advocates and Mexican officials, Coronilla Durán was visiting the United States on a valid tourist visa and had traveled from his hometown of San Luis de la Paz in Guanajuato to visit family and friends in Georgia before traveling to Florida’s coast.
The incident occurred when Coronilla Durán and three others stopped at a gas station parking lot before 7 a.m. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and Homeland Security Investigations officers encountered the group, prompting all four to flee on foot. Coronilla Durán ran across a busy road into the path of a semi truck. The circumstances that prompted the initial encounter remain unclear, as do the details of what happened to the other three occupants of the vehicle. U.S. authorities have not publicly identified the deceased, though Mexican officials confirmed his identity.
Coroniilla Durán’s wife, Yezzika Alamilla, reportedly told advocates he had entered on a tourist visa and was not working. An advocacy group assisting farmworkers in Central Florida provided Alamilla with travel assistance and lodging after her husband’s death. Mexican state officials stated that Alamilla indicated her husband had been in the country for only a brief period and possessed proper documentation. The Department of Homeland Security has not responded to inquiries regarding the visa status.
Coroniilla Durán leaves behind two children. Mexican authorities stated they have requested state attorneys general in the U.S. review deaths of migrants in immigration enforcement encounters for possible criminal prosecution. His death marks at least the tenth fatal encounter involving immigration agents since enforcement operations intensified last year, following fatal shootings in Texas and Maine within the same week.
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