El Paso shooting victim dies after 9 months in hospital

(NBC) EL PASO, Texas — A man shot in the Aug. 3 attack targeting Latinos in an El Paso Walmart died after months in the hospital, raising the death toll from the attack to 23, according to a hospital official.

“After a nearly nine-month fight, our hearts are heavy as we report Guillermo ‘Memo’ Garcia, our last remaining patient being treated from the El Paso shooting, has passed away,” said Del Sol Medical Center CEO David Shimp.

Garcia and his wife Jessica Coca Garcia were fundraising for their daughter’s soccer team in the Walmart parking lot when the suspected gunman opened fire that Saturday morning.

Garcia is survived by his wife, who suffered leg wounds but recovered. A week after the shooting, she rose from her wheelchair to give a speech across the road from the county jail where the suspected shooter was being held.

“Racism is something I always wanted to think didn’t exist. Obviously, it does,” she said.

The suspect, Dallas-area man Patrick Crusius, 21, remains in the same jail awaiting trial. State prosecutors have charged him with murder and are pursuing the death penalty, and federal prosecutors charged him with hate crimes.