Hundreds mourn Missouri couple's killing in Guatemala, call for ICE accountability 23%
By Brian Munoz73%
8/3/2026, 7:07:24 AM
BS Summary: This article contains 23 faulty reasoning types, including Indoctrination, Politically Left Leaning Bias, and Post Hoc (False Cause), with Appeal to Emotion as the most egregious example at 13.9% saturation with 143 hits. Analysis detected 1,283 faulty-reasoning hits from 1,030 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 29.6% and a BS Rank of 23% (22,404 of 28,880 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 77.60% of the article peer group.
Hundreds of community members gathered outside Overland City Hall on Sunday night to mourn the killings of former Overland residents Glendy González de la Cruz and Nixon Perez Paz in Guatemala.
Weeks after González de la Cruz took her three young daughters and rejoined her husband, Nixon, following his ICE deportation last year, the couple was found bound and shot to death in a sugarcane field.
A spokesperson for the federal agency told St.
Louis Public Radio that he was deported for being in the U.S. without legal status.
Guatemalan law enforcement officials said they did not immediately know who the assailants were, nor their motives for the killings.
"We need pathways to citizenship, but a pathway to better citizenship for us all," said Yery Castillo, a friend of González de la Cruz and an organizer with Fuerza, a St.
Louis-based immigrant rights group that organized the vigil.
"Citizenship that provides us access to quality affordable health care, clean, safe housing and good-quality union jobs."
The couple's eldest daughters were students in the Ritenour School District.
Superintendent Chris Kilbride said teachers in his district have attempted to keep providing high-quality education, despite the significant fear and uncertainty around increases in federal immigration enforcement.
"It's a tragedy," he said ahead of his public remarks.
"We just need to not normalize that we have teachers going to [detention centers] to connect with students detained with their families.
That's not normal for educators."
Remembering loved ones
Olga Pérez Paz, Nixon's sister, attended the vigil alongside her daughter and grandson.
She collapsed into a friend's arms after the remarks, tears streaming from her face.
"I can't think right now, I don't have the words," she said following the remarks.
"I'm happy to see that [Nixon and Glendy] have so much support here."
Rolando Pérez Paz told STLPR last week that his brother and González de la Cruz loved spending time with their family, going to local parks and being devoted parishioners at their local church.
"We have to figure out what to do with the children," he said in Spanish.
"The reason we left [for the U.S.] was to provide for our family—to pay for their education and ensure that, down the road, they could make something of themselves."
Liliana Gopar was one of González de la Cruz's best friends.
The 31-year-old mother of three had met González de la Cruz years ago after realizing their daughters were in the same classroom during the COVID-19 pandemic.
"The kids would go over to my house, or my daughter would go over to her house, and that's how we started our friendship," Gopar told STLPR in an exclusive interview.
"Since then, our friendship grew.
There's so many things, so many memories with her."
Gopar recalled going to González de la Cruz's house late at night, shortly before leaving the country, to give her youngest daughter, Marisol, a Lilo & Stitch blanket (her favorite character) and a small saint to protect Glendy on her journey back to Central America.
The two friends embraced and wept outside the Guatemalan woman's Overland home.
"I said: I love you.
Don't ever forget me," recalled Gopar.
"She said I love you too, which was very rare for us Hispanics because it's very hard for us to show emotion, but I did love her so much."
Weeks after taking her three daughters to rejoin their father in Guatemala, the couple was found bound and killed in a sugarcane field.
Community members found Giovanni, the couple's 14-month-old daughter, crying beside her mother's body.
"If [ICE] wouldn't have stopped them, none of this would have happened," said Gopar.
"These children would be here, happy without the pain of losing both parents and it just angers me because this government did this to them."
Pou Gopar said the U.S. immigration system is broken and should be reformed to allow immigrants an equitable pathway to citizenship.
She added that the Trump administration's immigration enforcement system unjustly targets hardworking, innocent people.
"We're not all criminals.
She wasn't a criminal.
She was a mother, a hardworking mother, a great friend, a great neighbor, and she didn't deserve this," said Gopar.
"It's them to blame because they did this to her.
Her fear of walking out, getting pulled over, being separated from her children, and being away from her husband is their fault."
Elected officials weigh in
Elected officials at the vigil decried the killings and unannounced federal immigration enforcement in the north St.
Louis County community.
Overland Mayor Marty Little was met with boisterous cheers after reassuring the crowd that the city will not sign a 287(g) agreement to work with ICE.
Little previously told STLPR that he and the city's police department were not informed about the ICE operation last year that landed Pérez Paz in federal custody and later deported.
"With a population that is largely growing due to immigrant families, I don't think signing a 287(g) agreement provides them any comfort or safety," he said.
"We cannot risk the safety of those going through the proper channels to have the same fate as Nixon and Glendy."
Zimmerman said he believed the only solution to increase the St.
Louis region's population is to embrace immigrant growth — as it did with Bosnian refugee resettlement.
"We must be prepared to open our doors and welcome our neighbors and be the same St.
Louis ... that welcomed my grandparents and great grandparents when they came from another country," he said.
"This story is personal from me, and I think it should be personal from all walks of life in this community."
State Rep.
Ray Reed, D-Brentwood, said the community should remember that behind every immigration case is a human story whose lives can be forever changed by the decisions governments make.
"America has always been a nation of both laws and values.
We can uphold the rule of law while never losing sight of our common humanity," he wrote in a statement ahead of the vigil.
"Those principles are not in conflict.
In fact, they are strongest when they exist together."
Copyright 2026 St.
Louis Public Radio
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100%flagged-word coveragePou Gopar
95 attributed words13% of attributed speech18% writer coverage
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