The disappearance and killing of Vanessa Guillén, a U.S. Military specialist stationed in Fort Hood, Texas, in 2020 shook the nation and led to widescale adjustments in how the army protects victims of sexual violence.
On Saturday, a state freeway in her hometown, Houston, will probably be named after the Mexican American soldier, a part of a collection of commemorations to honor her legacy.
Household and officers gathered on State Freeway 3 in Harris County, between the intersections of Interstate Freeway 45 and Almeda Genoa Highway, to mark the naming of the Vanessa Guillén Memorial Freeway.
The ceremony comes two years after Guillén, 20, was reported lacking. She was final seen alive on April 22, 2020. Her disappearance garnered requires an investigation from Latino civil rights teams and even worldwide celebrities, together with the actor Salma Hayek. Rep. Sylvia García, D-Texas, who was helping the Guilléns for months, echoed the significance of protecting the case within the public eye.
“She might have been any certainly one of our daughters,” García beforehand instructed NBC Information. “She might have been our niece, our granddaughter, everyone recognized with it.”
Guillén’s stays had been discovered close to the bottom two months later. She was promoted to specialist posthumously. Spc. Aaron Robinson, 20, shot and killed himself when police moved in to arrest him in reference to Guillén’s disappearance and loss of life, authorities mentioned in July 2020.
Guillén’s homicide galvanized a motion to finish sexual violence within the army. Previous to her loss of life, Guillén instructed kin and colleagues at Fort Hood that she had been sexually harassed. This 12 months, lawmakers handed the I Am Vanessa Guillén Act, which goals to guard victims of sexual violence within the army.
“The easiest way to honor my sister was by having historical past being made in her honor, in her reminiscence,” Mayra Guillén, Vanessa’s older sister, mentioned at a information convention in January.
The renaming ceremony is a part of a collection of commemorations for the slain soldier in Texas, together with a collection of 20 murals by native artists, one for every year of her life, stories KCEN-TV, an NBC affiliate. State lawmakers accepted a invoice to make Sept. 30, Guillén’s birthday, “Vanessa Guillén Day.”
Final 12 months, Fort Hood unveiled a gate named in her honor.
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