Alejandro “Alex” Rojas-Garcia and his sister had a special bond. They were seven years apart in age, and when they were younger, they’d play silly games together.
“We’d jump from couch to couch and pretend our dog was a shark,” 30-year-old Aleida Silva Garcia said with a laugh.
She believed everything her brother said, including the story he told her about being able to teleport to different parts of the house. When they got older, they enjoyed doing things together like hiking, fishing, bowling and dancing.
“What was so cool about our relationship is that he always included me in things that he did. I felt like we were best friends,” she said. “We liked to check out all the different things going on in the city, and it’s heartbreaking to see how the city continues to develop, but he’s not here. It’s been hard.”
Alex and his sister
Alex, who was also known as “Luchi,” was shot and killed Jan. 24, 2015 in the Feltonville section of North Philadelphia. He was 34. On May 4, 2018, a A 25-year-old man from Camden, NJ was found guilty of Alex’s murder after a four-day trial.
Alex was born Dec. 20, 1980 in Philadelphia. He developed a love for animals when he was young. His mother, Aleida Garcia, said when he was 5 or 6, she noticed a bunch of stray cats in their backyard, and Alex told her he’d been feeding them.
One of them had a problem with its eye, and so Alex convinced his mother to take him and the cat to the SPCA veterinary clinic to get it checked out. Alex paid for it himself out of his allowance.
“He really cared about animals and he was willing to spend his money on them,” she said. “He also had a lot of patience with him.”
Fishing was another one of his interests. He’s cast his line down the shore, or in the Delaware or Schuylkill. In fact, he was living in East Falls because it offered easy access to the river.
Alex was a gifted writer and musician. He won the Pennsylvania Creative Written Expression contest with his poem, “There’s Always an I in Choice,” and in his late teens and early 20s, he rapped with a group called Latin Linxx.
He worked in accounts receivables for Wachovia Bank and Alliance One, a profession where he excelled. He was written up in trade journals as loan collector of the year more than once, his mother said.
Alex decided to go back to school to be able to better provide for his kids, who are now 17 and 19. He graduated with honors from the Community College of Philadelphia in December 2014 and at the time of his death, he was enrolled at Temple University working on a bachelor’s degree in marketing.
His family is struggling to come to terms with the fact that he is gone.
“He was very much loved,” Aleida Garcia said of her son. “It’s been very difficult for us to figure out how to continue our lives. We’ve just been starting to put our feet on the ground after all this time.”
She has become an activist for victims and their families since Alex’s death. She is the founder of the National Homicide Justice Alliance, which has the mission of empowering victims’ families to advocate for themselves and providing guidance on navigating the system.
Losing her brother has also changed Aleida Silva-Garcia’s life.
“Life is very precious. We really don’t know how much time we have,” she said. “It’s important to live in the moment and enjoy the time that you have with your friends and your family, just really embracing that and being grateful for the things you do have. So, I really try to live like that and be the best person I can be for my brother.”
Alex’s funeral service took place Feb. 3, 2015 at the First Presbyterian Church and 21st and Walnut. He was laid to rest at Saint Peter and Saint Paul Cemetery in Springfield, Pa.
