Diane Guerrero is an Colombian American actress, author, and philanthropist. She was born in New Jersey, but was raised in Boston. She was born on July 21, 1986. She currently has two books published and is still acting for a living.

Guerrero’s childhood was really difficult. At the age of 14, both her parents and older brother were deported back to Colombia. Her parents had overstayed their visas and she was scared of getting taken away and having to live in foster homes. She wanted to finish school to later become an actress. Unfortunately her parents weren’t able to return to the United States so she had to continued life without family support. She kept all her emotions to herself and later on found out she had post-traumatic stress disorder because of the whole experience.

Her acting career began at the age of 24. She is mostly known for her role as Maritza in Orange is The New Black and Lina in Jane the Virgin. She came out with her first book in 2016 called In the Country We Love: My Family Divided, about her life at 14 and her parents deportation. Now she has a second book called My Family Divided: One Girl’s Journey of Home, Loss, and Hope, also about her life experience and all the challenges she faced at such a young age.

“My parents’ deportation gave me so much strength to keep on moving forward,” expressed Guerro. “Because any type of failure couldn’t be as bad as what I had already gone through.”