Pacoima Tamales Vendor Suffers a Heart Attack During ICE Raid

Names have been altered or omitted in this story to protect identities due to immigration status. 

For 10 years, Matilde has been selling tamales at the same location, by Lowe’s on Paxton Street in Pacoima, working hard to live the “American Dream” and support her family. But on June 19, her life was turned upside down when several unmarked vehicles arrived with masked men wearing United States Border Patrol tactical gear. 

Matilde was fixing her umbrella when the first car arrived, and suddenly, men came running towards her. Without asking any questions, without presenting a warrant, the federal immigration agents began grabbing the 54 year old using force to detain her. 

A man grabbed her from behind, she said. With his arms around her waist and his body weight pressing into her, Matilde started to have difficulty breathing. Meanwhile, another man in front of her grabbed her hands. 

“I told them about two or three times, ‘I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe,’” Matilde recounted. “But the guy behind me, grabbing my waist, pulled tighter.”

Despite Matilde’s pleas, they used such intense force that she lost consciousness. When she woke up, she was on the floor, and the men were trying to sit her upright. 

“I just kept telling them that I couldn’t breathe and that my chest hurt a lot,” Matilde recalled telling them after she regained consciousness. “And they didn’t listen to me.”

In that moment, she looked towards the small Virgen de Guadalupe that she keeps next to her stand and prayed, “Virgen, help me. Don’t abandon me.”

Bystander videos from the incident show another woman identifying herself as a nurse being denied access to Matilde to provide care. Luckily, another witness called 911 and Los Angeles Fire Department paramedics quickly arrived and began checking Matilde’s pulse. 

“They [immigration enforcement] just left me lying there on the ground,” she said. 

Matilde was transported to Providence Holy Cross Medical Center, where doctors confirmed she was having a minor heart attack. 

A Weekend in the Hospital

“I’m still in fight or flight,” said Matilde’s daughter, Diana. “I haven’t really had a chance to process what’s been happening.”

Not long after Diana returned home from working the night shift as a certified nursing assistant on that fateful Thursday, she woke up to her 15-year-old younger brother on the phone with their mom. 

Through broken tears, Matilde was saying, “They’re deporting me. They’re taking me away,” recalled Diana. 

The two kids quickly jumped in the car and drove down the street to where their mom sets up her stand. 

Still on the phone, the paramedic told them, “Your mom is not doing well, we’re gonna take her to the hospital,” Diana recounted. 

Her brother responded, “Wait, so she’s safe?!” elated to hear that their mother was going to the hospital instead of being in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).  

“Once we got to the emergency room, my mom was sitting there waiting for her name to be called, and she was just crying,” said Diana. “My brother ran to her, and they were just holding each other, and they were crying.”

Despite arriving in an ambulance, Matilde was routed to the waiting room, where she remained for 12 hours before being admitted at around 11 p.m., said Diana, who spent the night at the hospital by her mother’s side. 

Diana woke up Friday morning, on her 28th birthday, and recited the same words she says every year to her mother: “Thank you so much for giving me life. Thank you so much for being my mom and letting me be in this world.”

Doctors spent the day doing multiple tests – X-rays, CT scans, MRIs – and performed a surgery to check Matilde’s heart for blockages. The tests continued through Monday, when she was finally discharged. 

“There isn’t any damage to her heart, but she did suffer a small heart attack,” the doctor told Diana. 

Matilde is now on mandatory rest while she recovers. But she said fear is what has lingered the longest. 

“I’m traumatized,” said Matilde. “I don’t even want to walk to the corner. 

“I’m having nightmares,” she continued. “My [blood] pressure is not going down because of my nightmares. If I see white cars or trucks, I think it’s ICE.”

For now, the family is trying to take things day by day. 

“I just want to help her feel better, emotionally and physically,” said Diana. “I just want her to be able to get back to being the strong woman she was before all of this happened – where she had no fear, where she didn’t have to look around the corner or anything like that.”

Raza Helps Raza

Matilde emigrated to the San Fernando Valley 29 years ago from Michoacán, Mexico, and has been selling tamales for the past 22 years. Now she has a street vendor permit and pays taxes for her well-established business. 

Because her husband, who is also undocumented, recently had surgery to remove prostate tumors, the burden has been on Matilde to pay the rent and cover the cost of food for the household. She said she couldn’t afford to stay home every day, despite hearing about increased Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activity. 

The Friday before the incident, Matilde heard ICE would be in the neighborhood, so she stayed home that Saturday and Monday. Confident that the worst of the raids had passed, she returned to her usual spot, never expecting the kind of terror she experienced. This was the first time Matilde had ever seen ICE in her neighborhood. 

“I did have that fear of just like, oh, it might happen to us,” said Diana. “But it didn’t hit me until it happened before my eyes. Until it happened to my own mom.”

Diana, who was born and raised in the valley, is now stepping up to take on the responsibility of being the breadwinner for the household. 

“After this whole ordeal, I’m just telling both of them, just stay in,” she said. “I work two jobs. I can do my best to protect the house and maintain what we have.”

But Diana is not alone. The community, who love and care for Matilde, have been calling nonstop since the news broke last week, insisting on helping in any way they can. 

“Watching the videos of how everyone came to protect her and then getting all of these phone calls, it made me realize how strong our community is, how many people cared about her,” said Diana.  

Reluctantly, Diana, who doesn’t like to ask for help, set up a GoFundMe page so that family and friends could donate to help her mom recover. To Diana’s surprise, they have already raised almost $30,000.  

“I’m really grateful for the community that I live in,” she said. “Our officials could only do so much, but our community is what makes everything run. 

“Raza helps raza,” said Diana, adding that she hopes people will continue “to work together [and] do what we have to do in order to try and keep families together.”

To donate to Matilde’s recovery, visit the family’s GoFundMe