Texas Wildlife Reservation Renamed to Memorial Jocelyn Nungaray at Official Ceremony
The Trump administration has renamed a Houston girl to the Anawak National Wildlife Refuge in Texas, while a Houston girl said it was brutally killed by two Venezuelan illegal immigrants last year.
The park, now known as the Jocelyn Nungaray National Wildlife Refuge, held a renaming ceremony on Thursday. Anahuac's 39,000-acre shelter along the Texas Gulf Coast is home to migratory birds and wildlife managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
“Let the land speak her name. The power to make it quiet echoes her spirit. It proves that her life is important,” Home Secretary Doug Burgum said at a ceremony attended by Nungaray's mother. “And her story, no matter the heartbreaking simplicity, needs to be told, retelled, never forgotten.”
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The Anahuac National Wildlife Rebuge became the Jocelyn Nungaray National Wildlife Rebuge on Thursday in memory of the 12-year-old girl who was brutally murdered by two suspected Venezuelan immigrants last year. (kriv)
President Donald Trump announced in a joint Congress speech in March that the shelter respected Nungarany showed his signature with an executive order to change the park’s name.
“I didn't know this would happen,” Jocelyn's mother, Alexis Nungaray, told Fox 26 at the time. “I was stunned. I really didn't know how to react. It was very surreal and very bittersweet.”
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Franklin Jose Peña Ramos, left and Johan Jose Martinez-Rangel, right, are accused of killing Jocelyn Nungaray of Houston, Texas. (Harris County Jail)
During Thursday's ceremony, Bogum pointed out that Nungaray loved animals while expressing condolences to his mother who did not speak.
“Jocelyn's family found peace in the tranquility of the Jocelyn Nungaray National Wildlife Refuge. It is an enduring tribute to the beautiful young souls we have taken from us,” said Gov. Greg Abbott of Texas.
In June 2024, Jocelyn Nungaray, 12, was found strangled to death in a Houston Creek in Houston Creek. (Fox Houston is provided by the Nungaray family)
Nunigare's death has attracted national attention amid criticism of millions of illegal immigrants, some of the Biden administration with violent criminal records and street gang ties, who entered the United States during their presidency.
Prosecutors said in December that they would seek death penalty for her defendant killers, Johan Jose Martinez-Rangel, 22, and Franklin Jose Peña Ramos, 26.
Authorities say both men kidnapped Newnegare and caused her death by putting pressure on her neck. They allegedly sexually assaulted her and then left her body under the bridge.
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The search warrant later revealed that the people may be bloodthirsty members Venezuelan gangs Tren de Aragua illegally entered the United States before the killing.
