Juan Jairo Coronilla Duran, a 28-year-old Mexican tourist, died on July 14 after being struck by a tractor-trailer while fleeing Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in St. Augustine, Florida. His death has become the focal point of mounting concerns about the safety and tactics of federal immigration enforcement operations under the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign.
Coronilla Duran was sitting in a car with three other people outside a Wawa gas station near State Road 16 when ICE and Homeland Security Investigations agents approached them around 6:42 a.m. Early that Tuesday morning, all four vehicle occupants fled on foot. As Coronilla Duran attempted to cross State Road 16, he ran directly into the path of a tractor-trailer traveling in the right lane. The driver immediately stopped and attempted to render aid, but Coronilla Duran died at the scene with fatal injuries.
The man’s identity was established through the Mexican Consulate and confirmed by Colectivo Árbol, an Orlando-based nonprofit and farmworkers’ advocacy organization. His wife, Yésica Alamilla López, traveled to Florida to help arrange the return of his remains to their home country.
According to Alamilla López, her husband had entered the United States on a valid tourist visa just three weeks prior and had only been in Florida for two days when the encounter occurred. He was planning to return home within days of the incident. “He had a tourist visa and had been here in the United States for a short time—only three weeks,” she told reporters after arriving at Orlando International Airport from Mexico. “He had been in Florida for just two days.”
The family was originally from San Luis de La Paz, a small city in Guanajuato state. Alamilla López and Coronilla Duran had been married for ten years and share a seven-year-old son and a seven-month-old daughter. They operated a small business together in their hometown. Isaret Jeffers, founder of Colectivo Árbol, revealed that Coronilla Duran had already purchased a return flight ticket to Mexico for the following Saturday.
A witness to the tragedy offered details about the final moments. Jose Rivera, a local garbage truck driver, told reporters that Coronilla Duran slipped and fell when he reached a small piece of grass in the median of the highway. After picking himself up, Coronilla Duran stumbled into oncoming traffic. “The traffic was coming pretty quick, and he just lost his footing and didn’t look where the traffic was coming,” Rivera said. “He kept looking back.”
Alamilla López learned of her husband’s death while watching television, a discovery that prompted her immediate travel to the United States to address her family’s needs. She worked with the Mexican Consulate in Orlando to arrange transportation of his body back to Mexico.
The death marks the third fatality involving ICE operations in a single week and at least the tenth death linked to immigration enforcement encounters since President Trump returned to office and prioritized mass deportations as a cornerstone of his second-term agenda. The incident has intensified scrutiny of federal immigration enforcement operations and raised questions about the circumstances that lead people to flee from immigration agents.
One week before Coronilla Duran’s death, Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, a 52-year-old Mexican immigrant and small business owner, was fatally shot by an ICE officer during a traffic stop in Houston. Authorities later acknowledged that Salgado Araujo was not the intended target of the enforcement operation. Just one day before the Florida incident, Johan Sebastián Durán Guerrero, a 26-year-old Colombian national, was fatally shot by an ICE agent in Biddeford, Maine after agents attempted to stop his vehicle. Durán Guerrero, too, was not the target of the operation and had valid legal authorization to work in the United States, including a work permit and Social Security number.
The deaths have sparked broader concerns about the safety implications of immigration enforcement tactics. On the same day Coronilla Duran was struck by the truck, ICE began temporarily ending vehicle stops following the fatal incidents in Texas and Maine, sources indicated. The incident has also drawn international attention, with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum announcing an investigation into the deaths of at least 18 Mexican nationals since Trump returned to office.
Community members gathered along State Road 16 in St. Augustine the evening after Coronilla Duran’s death to hold a vigil honoring his memory. More than a hundred people assembled at the site, with flowers, candles, and handmade signs lining the roadside as community members prayed, sang, and called for changes to federal immigration enforcement operations.