Claudia returns home to Guatemala

Nearly two weeks ago, a US Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) agent killed a young Guatemalan woman trying to cross the border into the US. Claudia Patricia Gómez González was shot in the head.

Nina Lakhani and Tom Dart have her story in 'Claudia was a good girl. Why did they kill her?' From a Guatemalan village to death in Texas in the Guardian.

Like many Guatemalans, Claudia left because of the lack of opportunity in her country. She was an aspiring accountant.

After more than a year stuck at home with no job and no money, the future looked bleak. One by one, her school friends were giving up on work, to get married and have babies, but Gómez wanted more. “I’m going to America,” she told her parents firmly. “Don’t worry, I’ll be back in a few years.”

She left home in early May, excited about the impending adventure in the US, where she hoped to find work to pay for university – and be reunited with her boyfriend, who had made it to Virginia about a year earlier.

It was 3am when she hugged her grandmother Tomasa Vicente, 70, and told her: “Don’t worry abuela, I’ll be back soon – I promise.”

Claudia was killed about one-third of a mile from the border under suspicious circumstances. The CPB's version of her death has changes and the FBI is now investigating. The US has thousands of poorly trained agents on the border who act with relative impunity. I'm not sure why we should expect justice in Claudia's case.

According to a recent report from Save the Children, Guatemala ranks dead last in the region based on the gravity of threats confronted by children. Guatemala has its fair share of violence committed by gang and organized crime groups. However, it is the overall poor social, political, and economic environment that forced Claudia to leave, and will continue to force thousands of young Guatemalans to leave each month. The country's political and economic elite are more interested in helping themselves than they are helping young people like Claudia.