Mother of Texas teen trafficked and killed blames police for missed protection and delayed ID
Kristen Galvan’s family says Houston and Montgomery County authorities failed to protect her after she testified and took over six years to identify her remains.
Partial skeletal remains recovered beneath a bridge in Missouri City in January 2020 have been positively identified as those of Kristen Galvan, a 15-year-old Houston girl who was groomed, trafficked and killed in late 2019. The Texas attorney general’s office disclosed the identification on 28 July after advanced DNA analysis conducted over the previous year. Galvan’s mother, Robyn Cory, contends that Houston police failed to provide witness protection after her daughter supplied written statements that aided the conviction of three traffickers, and that Montgomery County officials refused an Amber Alert when Galvan vanished again in January 2020.
The sheriff’s office only assigned the case to a human-trafficking unit weeks after her disappearance, and earlier attempts to identify the remains with standard DNA methods were unsuccessful. The homicide investigation continues, and the family has raised concerns about missed opportunities to save Galvan’s life.
Why it matters
The case highlights gaps in law-enforcement response to trafficking victims and the importance of timely forensic identification.
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