When Farce Repeats Itself

 

Jeffrey St. Clair 

Put yourself behind the wheel of Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero’s white Kia. You’re 25-years-old. You’ve been living in the United States for three years. You’ve played by the rules, as you understand them. You haven’t made trouble for anyone. You haven’t broken the law. You’ve tried to settle in.

You came to Maine from Colombia looking for a safer and fuller life for yourself, for your wife and your infant daughter, the girl you called your “little princess.”

You didn’t come to Maine to deal drugs, join a gang, rape or rob anyone or leech off the system. You came to work and make a new home for your family. You applied for and received a permit to work legally in the United States more than a year ago. The permit was authorized by the Trump-run government.

Your love for animals led you to get a job cleaning a veterinary clinic each morning. It wasn’t your dream job, but it was a good start for a good cause. It wasn’t enough to get by on, so you got a second job delivering groceries and food in the afternoon and early evening in your white Kia.

You were doing okay. Your daughter had just turned three. You and your wife, Karo, had made a new life for yourselves. The transition was a challenge, but you did it.  You and Karo were learning the language. Getting a good feel for the way of the land and the way things were supposed to work here. You were trying to fit in. You were starting to feel at home.

You felt safe here in coastal Maine. You’d heard about ICE. You’d seen the shootings and arrests and protests. But somehow here in Biddeford, you felt far removed from the terrors visited upon immigrants in Minneapolis, Los Angeles and Chicago. This was a quiet city. You and your neighbors cared about each other. You felt safe; you felt secure.

You grew up as a middle-class kid in Bucaramanga, Colombia. A big city in the mountains. Colombia had been through wars. It had been plagued by gang violence. Riven by political corruption. You’d been through it. Things were more stable now. But for how long?

You’d grown up playing soccer. You did well enough in school. You served in the Colombian military and survived the experience mostly unscathed. Your dad sold truck tires. You installed windows. You had a bulldog you cherished named Draco. But it just wasn’t enough. Not after you fell in love. Not after your daughter was born. You wanted a better life, especially for your kid. So, you took up a friend’s offer to come north to Maine and work for him.

You got up early Monday morning. You played with your daughter. You talked with your wife. You drank your coffee, ate your breakfast and got ready for work.

It looked like a nice summer day as you walked to your car. You started the engine, pulled onto the street and headed out to do your job.

You had no idea that ICE was coming for you. Why would you? You were here legally. You hadn’t committed any crimes. You weren’t wanted by law enforcement. There were no warrants out for your arrest or removal from the country.

Before you reached the first intersection, you were surrounded by cars and men with guns. They were shouting. Why were they shouting? What did they want? What had you done?

One of the men is pointing a gun at you. He says stop. You say you are trying to stop. You say it loud enough that a neighbor hears your voice. The man pointing the gun at you may hear it, too. Surely he does, doesn’t he? But this man doesn’t know you. He doesn’t know anything about you. That you’re here legally. That you’re on your way to work. That you just said goodbye to your daughter and her mother. This man doesn’t know that you’re not the man he’s looking for. But he doesn’t care. He’s got you in his sights and he’s not going to let you go. You hear a shot. It’s the last sound you hear before everything goes black. As your body slumped to the whole, your Kia kept going, in slow, aimless circles before coming to a stop.

Your wife and your daughter were in the apartment where you lived when they heard the shots that killed you. Your daughter dropped her pink backpack to the floor. Karo ran to the window. She saw the white Kia lodged against the curb. The windshield was shattered with bullet holes. Then she saw you. She saw your body, at least, flat on the pavement. Your body is all bled out. There’s a bullet wound to your head. “Mi amor, mi amor,” Karo screamed.

These men who shot you, who killed you, who murdered you, lied about you before they even knew who you were. They said you were “illegal.” They said they had a warrant to pick you up. You weren’t illegal. They didn’t have a warrant for you. You weren’t the man they wanted. They lied about you after they killed you. They said you tried to kill them with Kia. They said you were going to run over other people. They said they had no choice but to kill you. These men, these law enforcement officers, lied to cover their own asses. 

At 7 in the morning, the phone rings at your parents’ house in Bucaramanga. It’s the day of the Virgin of Chiquinquirá, the patron saint of Colombia. The neighbors hear screams from your parents’ house. It’s your mother’s voice. She’s saying, “It can’t be. It can’t be. I’d give my life for my son. Why did they shoot him?”

Why, indeed.

COUNTERPUNCH