Source: Variety / Getty
Actress Diane Guerrero, who doesn’t look a day over 21, is celebrating her 37th birthday today.
The beauty is best known for her roles as inmate Maritza Ramos on Orange Is The New Black and Lina on Jane The Virgin. Outside of acting, Guerrero is also a scholar and advocate for immigration reform and civil rights. At the age of just 14 years old, she was separated from her family, as her parents and older brother did not have U.S. Citizenship and were deported back to Colombia.
“I was 14 years old and came home from school to an empty house – it felt as if all the action in the house had been stopped in a freeze frame. Dinner was on the stove and the car was outside, but the house was silent. I soon learned from a neighbor that my parents had been picked up by immigration agents. I had no idea what to do,” Guerrero revealed. “It was the worst day of my life and I realized from then on that everything was going to be very difficult. However, my parents taught me to be resilient and resourceful, and I knew I was going to fight for my place in the world.
Guerrero went on to study performing arts in high school, then political science and communications in college. What we love about her most is: all these years later, she never stopped fighting or representing the underdog. She’s also used her platform to speak up for Black folks and the Black Lives Matter movement.
“We call for a national defunding of police. We demand investment in our communities and the resources to ensure Black people not only survive, but thrive,” she wrote in one message last year. “Policing is an inherently problematic tool. It began with colonialism, continued with slavery, and to this day facilitates inequality and suppresses civil rights. (Disproportionately Harms and kills Black people!!!) Police are fundamentally ill-equipped to handle a wide range of human needs: mental health emergencies, drug addiction, and homelessness to name a few. This fundamental flaw will not be fixed by a series of superficial procedural reforms.”
To add to her strength, intelligence, and compassion, Diane Guerrero is also simply beautiful. More photos of the entertainer in all her glory below! God truly took his time with her.
