The suicide of a father of three, who was working as a gardener in California, near the Tijuana-San Diego border has prompted shock and anger

This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

A Mexican man has leaped off a bridge and killed himself near the Tijuana-San Diego border crossing hours after being deported.



Guadalupe Olives Valencia reportedly screamed he did not want to return to Mexico before leaping to his death on Tuesday. The 44-year-old father of three had worked as a gardener in California.

Authorities are investigating his death as suicide. He had been deported six times.

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Mexican news reports showed the body sprawled on concrete near the El Chaparral border crossing. Beside it lay a plastic bag with some possessions issued by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) before he was deported earlier on Tuesday.

Relatives said he had been anxious about returning to Mexico and not being able to provide for his children.

The death prompted shock and anger at a sensitive political moment. This week the Trump administration unveiled sweeping measures to catch and deport potentially millions of undocumented people. Rex Tillerson, the US secretary of state, and John Kelly, the head of homeland security, are in Mexico City for fraught talks with Mexico’s government.

Tijuana, a sprawling, bustling city, is long accustomed to the daily sight of a gate on the US side swinging open and deportees shuffling across a pedestrian walkway to an uncertain future in Mexico. Some catch buses to the interior, others stay in local shelters or live on the streets.

Mexican immigration officials reportedly debriefed Olives and offered him food and transportation to a shelter on Tuesday morning. He declined. A short while later he jumped to his death. The US was yards away, behind a concrete barrier, over which flutter the stars and stripes.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest A view of the US-Mexican border fence from Tijuana, Mexico. Photograph: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

One Mexican newspaper reported that Olives shouted he did not want to return to Mexico, and that it was the anniversary of his wife’s death three years ago. Neither detail could be immediately verified.

He was “in desperation” about deportation because he doubted he could find work in Mexico to support his family, his niece, Yuriba Valles de Espinoza, told the Los Angeles Times. “He was doing this to take of care of his children. They were his entire life.”

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Olives’ aunt, Irma Delgado Rios, accused Donald Trump of raining “psychological blows” on undocumented people in the US. She asked that his death prompt help for others who ended up deported.

Olives grew up in Los Mochis, a coastal city in Sinaloa, but spent much of the past three decades in Tijuana with his mother, Cristina Valencia. She said she last spoke to him on Sunday and that she learned of his death through Facebook.

Mexican media reported Olives entered the US six times between 2007 and 2017, once in a car which was found to have drugs, and that he was jailed twice, in Arizona and Texas.

Tighter border controls have made crossing more perilous and pricey, with human traffickers known as coyotes routinely charging $7,000 or more per client, according to migrants. Crossing without a coyote seldom works, migrants also say.

Olives’ last attempt to enter was on Monday, which led to his expulsion on Tuesday.

The body is due to be transported to Los Mochis for burial.