Mother of murdered transgender teen speaks out on tolerance

Sylvia Guerrero, the mother of a murdered transgender teen, speaks to Michigan State University students Friday in preparation for National Transgender Day of Remembrance.

LANSING — Sylvia Guerrero clutches her styrofoam coffee cup and stares at me with blue-grey eyes and a steely determination forged in the emotional wreckage of an event that happened six years ago. Guerrero is in Lansing at the invitation of the Michigan State University Resident Hall Association and several LGBT student groups. She is a former law office employee who now devotes all of her time to telling her daughter’s story. Her dead daughter’s story. Her murdered transgender teenage daughter’s story.

“Gwen was murdered for being who she was,” Guerrero says bluntly. “That’s wrong.”

Gwen was Gwen Aruajo, Guerrero’s 17-year-old transgender daughter who was brutally beaten to death on Oct. 4, 2002. The beating, she said, was so severe that Aruajo had post-mortem bruises on her body. After the killers beat her, allegedly while in a meth-fueled rage over her lying about her gender, they drove four hours to the mountains and buried her body in a 3-foot-deep grave. To prevent scavengers from uncovering her remains, Guerrero said, the killers covered her body with large rocks, one of which crushed Gwen’s face.

“It’s sickening what they did to my daughter,” she said. “She had the right to live her life. They didn’t have the right to take her life.”

Four men were convicted of the crime. Two are serving 15 years to life on conviction of second degree murder, while the other two arranged plea bargains, garnering a nine-year sentence in one case and an 11-year sentence in the other.

The strength to tell Gwen’s story comes from a very deep sense of spirituality, Guerrero said. “I am a very spiritual person, and her spirit is always with mommy and I appreciate that,” she said. “Her physical body is gone, but her spiritual presence is here.”

Guerrero said Gwen’s murder is part of a plan and purpose from God.

“I know this is my purpose,” she said. “I am honored to be her mother because in her death she has saved thousands and thousands of lives.

“I never, ever want anyone to endure the pain and suffering I am still enduring from the loss of my daughter,” Guerrero said, the pain evident in her eyes. That pain, she said, fuels the march for equality that takes her all over the country speaking to college, high school and middle school students. There she tells students about Gwen, her murder and why it is important accept others.

“I am here to hopefully educate some people–to open some minds,” she said of her appearance at MSU on Friday to recognize yesterday’s MSU recognition of National Transgender Day of Remembrance. “Nothing is going to bring my daughter back. I am an advocate now, and I speak because I think it is important to share my daughter’s story. And creating change in this world that so desperately needs it. And now is the time. Things are happening and I believe there is a lot of hope for the LBGT community, but I believe there is a lot of work to do.”

Guerrero said Gwen came out to her as transgender when she was 14 years old.

“As a mom who loves her children unconditionally, it doesn’t matter to me. It wouldn’t have mattered to me if she was gay or straight or transgender — this is my baby who I gave birth to, whom I love,” she said. “So whether she was Eddie or Gwen, it didn’t matter to me. So she knew that I loved her. I respected her for who she was and I allowed her to be who she was.”

Guerrero thought Gwen was gay when she was younger, but says that was the result of her own lack of information about transgender issues and identities.

“It’s important because … students are our future,” Guerrero said of speaking to college students, many of whom are the same age Gwen would be. “It’s time for change, and they need to take their world back. I truly believe in my heart and soul that they can do it. Start being the role models to your peers and your family and your loved ones, [models] of respect and love and acceptance of one and other regardless of our differences, because we are all human beings. … And there is a lot of hate and evil and ignorance and homophobia and transphobia that goes on, and it breaks my heart to see that. And I know it first hand because I watched my daughter and I watched what it did to her.”

For parents who are struggling with a child who has come out, Guerrero has a clear message.

“Pray about it. Be patient. You really have to be patient. And get educated. There are so many tools out there for you to help you through this period,” she said. “Always keep in mind that this is your child regardless. This is the baby you brought into this world, who has confided in you, and your job is to love this child unconditionally and to be there for them. And yes the road is going to be hard ahead. But you know what? They need you now more than ever to be their cheerleader, to understand and accept them. Acceptance is the key thing to making them [able] to continue with their life. There are going to be more things against them than for them. I still love my daughter, even in her death.”

This story was also published in Between the Lines, the statewide newspaper for the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender community.