Diane Guerrero (born July 21, 1986) is an American actress and singer. She is known for her roles as inmate Maritza Ramos in the Netflix series Orange Is the New Black and Lina on Jane the Virgin. Her role on Orange Is the New Black has contributed to three consecutive wins for the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series. Guerrero is the author of In the Country We Love: My Family Divided, a memoir about her parents being detained and deported when she was fourteen. She starred as Kay Challis / Crazy Jane in the Max action-drama series Doom Patrol. She also voiced characters such as Jessica Cruz / Green Lantern in Justice League vs. the Fatal Five and Isabela Madrigal in the 2021 Disney film Encanto.
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Early life and education
Guerrero was born on July 21, 1986 in Passaic, New Jersey. She has an older maternal half-brother (born 1976). Her parents and brother emigrated from Palmira, Colombia in 1981 and settled in Boston, Massachusetts in 1987.
As the only member of her immediate family with American citizenship, Guerrero remained in the U.S. at the age of fourteen when her parents and older brother were deported back to Colombia after unsuccessfully pursuing legal citizenship. She emphasized that even though she was a minor, no government agency reached out to see if she was okay after this occurred. She relied solely on her friends' parents to help get her through the rest of high school and beyond. Guerrero has since become a strong advocate for immigration reform.
