Cynthia Fuller Leigh

1945 - 2024

Cynthia Fuller Leigh always thought that she led a charmed life. That ended on the morning of September 14, 2024 following metastatic breast cancer in the lungs. She was born in Monroe, Louisiana on October 30, 1945 to Cynthia and Ned Leigh. She played the piano by ear from age 2 and took 12 years of classical musical training but mostly enjoyed playing contemporary music. She was a Salutatorian at Neville High School in Monroe in 1963, Magna Cum Laude and Mortar Board at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge in 1967, and Order of the Coif at The University of Texas School of Law in Austin in 1984. Early in her career, she was a teacher at the alternative Greenbriar School near Bastrop, Texas, and later the Office Manager at Legal Aid of Central Texas in Austin. Following law school, she worked as an Assistant Attorney General in the Environmental Division of Attorney General Jim Mattox in 1985; but she found her real calling when Barbara Hines asked her to join her immigration and naturalization law practice in 1988. She enjoyed representing thousands of worthy immigrants become a part of the American dream and always considered herself fortunate to have found been invited into that branch of the law in which to make her career. She learned almost everything she knew of that practice from Barbara Hines and passed on her knowledge to her associates Iliana Holguin, Jackie Watson, and Kate Lincoln-Goldfinch. She was named a Board Certified Attorney in Immigration and Nationality Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization. She met Ishmael Herrera Soto in November 1984 and went on a happy whirlwind life from then until his untimely death in February 2017. She loved her stepchildren Martha J. Soto, Ishmael H. Soto II, Pablo R. Soto, and welcomed her daughter Cynthia Leigh Soto in June 1990. That mother-daughter relationship made her entire life very rewarding. She loved all her friends and valued and appreciated her extensive family for everything they did for her throughout her life. She leaves behind her children and grandchildren, and nieces and nephews. She particularly thanks her doctors and nurses throughout her last journey, especially Dr. Naheed Velji and his staff at Baylor Scott and White in Austin.