A Father Was Scheduled to Testify as a Witness in His Daughter's Murder Trial. He Was Later Found on a Plane to Be Deported

Just weeks before he was set to testify in his daughter's brutal murder case, a Texas father was nearly deported by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)—an ordeal attorneys say is scaring immigrants away from courthouses and making it harder to prosecute predators.

Carmelo Gonzalez, the father of 11-year-old Maria Gonzalez, was on track to provide crucial testimony against Juan Carlos Garcia Rodriguez, an 18-year-old charged with Maria's sexual assault and murder. Gonzalez discovered his daughter's body stuffed in a bag under a bed inside their Pasadena apartment in 2023. Days later, Garcia Rodriguez was arrested in Louisiana and charged with capital murder.

"To be that close to losing such a crucial witness is really scary," Harris County District Attorney Sean Teare told local news. "There's no way you try a case like this without giving that little girl a voice, without having the man who raised her and loved her from birth be able to talk about her to a jury."

On January 26, Gonzalez was arrested for his first DWI—a misdemeanor—but as an undocumented immigrant from Guatemala, he was flagged by ICE and taken into federal custody after posting bond, court records show.

By the time Teare's office found out about Gonzalez's detention, he was already on a plane, moments away from being deported.

"I have never seen a witness with a U-Visa application already in the process of being removed from the country within a week of going into ICE custody," Teare said. "I have never seen that even with someone without a U-Visa application."

Gonzalez is being held at a Conroe facility as officials work to stop his deportation.

"We are having less witness cooperation because of these policies, which means we are not able to prosecute the predators preying on our communities as effectively," he said. "These victims, these family members, these witnesses are scared to show up at the courthouse."

Teare made it clear that Gonzalez's DWI case will be handled like any other while his office continues monitoring cases affected by Trump's immigration crackdown.