Guillermo Garcia, 36, known as Memo or Tank, was a youth soccer coach and family man in El Paso who was fatally wounded after shielding his wife and children during a mass shooting outside the Cielo Vista Walmart on the morning of August 3, 2019. He and his wife were selling lemonade and snacks for his daughter’s soccer team when a gunman opened fire in what has been described as a racially motivated attack. Guillermo was shot twice in the leg and once in the back and sustained catastrophic injuries.
Rushed to Del Sol Medical Center, Garcia endured more than a dozen surgeries and remained the last hospitalized survivor of the attack. He died from his injuries late on the night of April 25, 2020; his wife Jessica Coca Garcia was also gravely wounded, shot three times in the legs, while their children, then 11 and 5, were physically unharmed.
The shooter, identified as 21-year-old Patrick Wood Crusius, was arrested after surrendering to police. Authorities say he traveled from Allen, Texas, and allegedly targeted Mexicans; a manifesto expressing anti-Hispanic and anti-immigrant sentiments was reported to have been found.
If anyone knew Guillermo, his family, or was at Cielo Vista Walmart that day, please share what you remember or any information that could help document his final months.