EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) — El Paso District Attorney Bill Hicks wrote a letter concerning emails allegedly sent by the former District Attorney’s Office that potentially impacted the immigration status of a Walmart shooting victim’s family member.
In the letter, it says under former District Attorney Yvonne Rosales, emails were sent by former Assistant District Curtis Cox to various federal law enforcement agencies regarding Rosa Maria Valdez Garcia, the widow of Alexander Hoffman who was killed in the Aug. 3, 2019 Walmart mass shooting.
“This office should never have attempted to influence in any way Ms. Rosa Maria Valdez Garcia’s immigration status or her ability to enter the country,” says the letter written by Hicks, who took over from Rosales after she resigned.
Hicks spoke with KTSM 9 News and said he wrote the letter at the request of the Hoffman family’s legal counsel Justin Underwood.
“If one of the assistant district attorneys under a previous administration had done something wrong in regards to someone’s immigration status, then it’s only incumbent on me to state that, that’s not our position,” Hicks said.
Hicks says his office is making a very strong stand.
“We don’t have any role in the determination of any immigration status, and anything that was represented in the past by anyone from this office, that’s not our position,” Hicks said.
Underwood, who represented the Hoffman family and continues to be the family’s legal counsel, says Valdez Garcia was detained by immigration officials for hours.
“Something happened obviously that interfered with her ability to cross. Just out of the blue, she got a letter saying, ‘Hey you’ve been revoked’ and the next time she tried to come over to visit me they detained her for eight hours at the bridge,” Underwood said.
Underwood says Valdez Garcia had to get parole from immigration to be able to come on Wednesday for the Walmart mass shooting suspect Patrick Crusius’ federal hearing, in which he pled guilty to federal hate crime charges.
As we have reported, there were allegations of intimidation of the Hoffman family by the former District Attorneys’ Office.
