LOS ANGELES — Santa Tecum wept softly as she hugged the clear plastic folder of photos to her chest.

The snapshots of her daughter, Emily Garcia, were the way Tecum wanted to remember her: Laughing, smiling, dancing to banda music, her makeup immaculate as ever. Not lying in a casket at a public viewing after her sudden death this year — the last time she laid eyes on Garcia.

"It's been very hard, I've been very, very sad," Tecum said in a recent interview with The Times, speaking through a Spanish interpreter. "Emily would always hug me when she would see me. She was always loving in that manner."

Garcia, 25, was found dead on a Tuesday in mid-October, in a truck parked outside the Hollywood shelter in the 1200 block of Lodi Place where she lived. Another person was also found dead in the vehicle.

Los Angeles police have said that preliminary investigation indicates Garcia died of a drug overdose and that no foul play is suspected, but the case remains open and her family and friends are still seeking answers.

Their pleas have been raised at City Council meetings and on social media, with supporters saying too often the deaths of trans people are overlooked by elected officials and the media. Tecum and two of her other daughters stood beside Councilmember Hugo Soto-Martinez at City Hall last month, as he honored Garcia on Trans Day of Remembrance.

She came to the U.S. as an "unaccompanied minor," he said, and as a young trans Latina living in L.A. she had faced "unimaginable obstacles with fierce resilience, bravery and determination."

Authorities counted a record-breaking number of hate crimes across L.A. County last year. According to the Los Angeles Police Department statistics, trans people were reported as victims in 69 incidents in 2023, up from 54 the year before.

Across the country, trans people and advocates say they fear for their safety after the election of Donald Trump, who ran a virulently anti-trans campaign, while also vowing to conduct mass deportations.

Garcia's death was a painful reminder of the challenges she and other trans people are forced to overcome, her older sister, Maria Tuch, said. "Behind all her joy and her happiness, there was sadness mainly from the discrimination that she faced from humanity or from others based on who she was."

Tuch said that her sister's death had been hard on everyone in their close-knit family.

Garcia grew up poor but was finally finding her footing in life, her sister said. She had found purpose and community while doing outreach for the TransLatin@ Coalition, an L.A.-based advocacy group that assists transgender immigrants. She was supposed to start a new marketing job a day before her body was found. Garcia dreamed of being financially independent and finding an apartment of her own, Tuch said, and the roughly $28 an hour she stood to earn would've helped achieve her goal.

She had also received her U.S. citizenship and was working to help their mother "get her papers" too, according to Tuch.

She described her sister as "very caring and loving."

"Even when we would fight she would say, 'Come here, give me a hug,'" she said.

Weekends were when they would hang out together, Tuch said. Garcia taught her how to apply lip liner and foundation and would offer fashion advice on their frequent shopping trips.

"Before I would wear just any random shoes," Tuch said, remembering how Garcia used to gently chide her about her appearance, saying things like, "You should be able to express yourself and try to put together a nice outfit."

Garcia, her sister said, used to always tell them jokingly: "I would rather be dead than to show up looking humble."

"She always very full of cheer and joy and now she's no longer here," Tuch said.

Tecum said Garcia was a loving daughter, who would call her regularly to check on her.

"She would say, 'Do you love me for who I am?' And I would say, 'Yes, if I didn't then I wouldn't pick up the phone,'" Tecum said.

That's why, when she hadn't heard from Garcia in a while, Tecum became worried.

On the weekend before her body was found, Garcia had obtained a pass from the shelter to attend a baby shower. Afterward, she went out with friends, some of whom told her family that they had received texts from her as late as Sunday.

A security guard found her and the other person in the truck roughly 48 hours later, on Oct. 15, police said.

They were in a truck parked outside Hollywood Studio Club, an L.A. landmark that opened nearly a century ago as a residence for women aspiring to work in the then-fledgling movie industry. Most recently it has been a shelter, including for trans women. The truck windows were tinted, which police say explains why two days passed before the bodies were discovered.

Police said officers at the scene found a white powdery substance that looked like fentanyl, but the results of a toxicology report remain pending. The absence of physical trauma to either Garcia or the person she was found with also suggests a drug overdose, police said.

It's standard for homicide detectives to investigate overdoses with two or more deaths or involve a minor. LAPD Det. Tyler Adams, a supervisor with the West Bureau homicide unit, said it appears Garcia's death was accidental.

"Obviously, I'm open to any other possibilities," Adams said.

Byron Jose, a police and advocacy strategist at TransLatin@ Coalition, said advocates have been speaking to people at the shelter and reaching out to their local council office and the LAPD. Garcia's family is seeking security video recordings from the shelter, hoping it will provide more answers.

Tuch said her sister wasn't known to use drugs.

"It's been hard to accept because I don't think it was an overdose," she said. "And we would like to again follow up with the authorities to make sure that they do a thorough investigation."

Tuch said she also found it suspicious that Garcia had been found in a pair of sweatpants, saying her sister took great pride in her appearance.

Asked about Garcia's family pushing back on the overdose theory, the detective said: "It's a loved one and it's difficult to accept, but the best I can do is to answer questions and to be truthful."

Public health officials announced earlier this year that drug overdose deaths plateaued countywide in 2023 with 3,092 deaths — the first time in a decade that such fatalities had not continued a year-over-year rise.

Tuch said she was grateful to the LAPD for meeting with them and going over the facts of the case. But, a lot about what happened to her sister still didn't add up, she said.

Questions kept building in her mind. Had anyone else been in the truck with Garcia and the other person? Why hadn't the medical examiner's office released her purse and other personal items yet? And why hadn't someone from the shelter noticed that Garcia hadn't checked back in?

Garcia had struggled to find stable housing, an issue she discussed in a podcast by the TransLatin@ Coalition about how the homeless shelter system fails transgender people.

Tuch said that she was going through her sister's phone after her death and was shocked and angered by the level of harassment that her sister faced as a trans woman.

"I can see messages where people would tell her, 'I know that you're still a man,' and she would say, 'No, I am a young lady,'" she said.

The messages, she said, make her believe someone was capable of harming her sister.

"I don't know if it was revenge or vengeance," Tuch said. "She was always very proud, very outspoken to be a transgender woman."

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