Despite a last minute plea from Kim Kardashian, an incarcerated father was not granted the temporary release he needed to attend the funeral of his daughter, who was one of 21 people killed in the Robb Elementary School massacre in Uvalde, Texas.
The 41-year-old reality TV star posted a photo of 10-year-old Eliahana “Ellie” Cruz Torres Thursday, along with an eleventh-hour request to free her father, Eli Torres.
“Her family are desperately hoping that her father, who is incarcerated for a non violent drug offense, be granted temporary release so that he can attend her funeral,” Kardashian wrote on Twitter and Instagram.
So far, the family’s “requests have been denied,” prompting Kardashian, a criminal justice reform advocate, to personally reach out to the Bureau of Prisons “so that he can say his last goodbye to his baby girl.”
“Every parent deserves that right,” she concluded.
Despite Kardashian’s efforts, Eli Torres was not released in time for his daughter’s funeral, The San Antonio Express-News reported.
Eliahana was killed alongside 18 of her classmates and a pair of teachers inside Robb Elementary school on May 24. Police said alleged gunman Salvador Ramos, armed with an AR-15, marched into the school and then barricaded himself inside a classroom. The 18-year-old remained inside the building for nearly an hour before he was shot and killed by a U.S. border patrol agent responding to the mass shooting.
Days after the violence, Eli Torres told the Houston Chronicle he was not granted the temporary freedom he would need to attend her funeral in person. Instead, he was told he would have to participate in the ceremony virtually.
“The choices I made, it cost me. I could have prevented this from happening, somehow, some way, as a father,” he said. “I could have stopped it somehow. Protected her.”
Torres is being held at Kentucky’s McCreary United States Penitentiary and is set to be released in 2033, according to WYMT. He added that his daughter’s death has left him so overwhelmed with grief that he is suffering from nightmares.
“The days and nights, they’re dark,” he said. “I can’t see no light.”
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