by Yariel Valdés González

TIJUANA, Mexico — Melani Sofía Rosales Quiñones, a transgender woman from Guatemala City, was on her way home one night in July 2017 when she saw a group of homophobes waiting for her. She said good evening to them and that alone provoked an atrocious attack.

“They hit me with bats and sticks,” Melani now recalls. “They broke my jaw and left jaw bone. I was in a coma in the hospital for three days and 15 days later I had surgery to reconstruct my face. They put in plates and screws. It took me four months to recover.”

A year later the gangs, who are full of hate and violence in Latin America, took over their house and turned it into a stash house. Melani’s mother never accepted this and filed a harassment complaint against the so-called “gangs.”

“They called my mom and threatened her as she was leaving the police station,” says Melani. “They said she can’t play with them and they will kill my younger brother who is 15.”

Melani shared part of her life with the Washington Blade from a guest house in downtown Tijuana where LGBTI members of the migrant caravan who arrived in this border city weeks earlier receive temporary refuge. Melani and other LGBTI migrants in Tijuana all hope to seek asylum in the U.S., a nation in which they think they can live without fear and with economic prosperity. Read more via Washington Blade