A #NativeAmerican girl was found dead and dismembered by an Arizona highway. Will her killer ever be found?

“Criminals and bad actors believe that they can get away with (crimes) on the Indian reservations.”
—attorney and activist Margo Hill-Ferguson

By Rob Picheta
Feb 13, 2026

"Carolyn Bender remembers her niece’s smile: broad and vibrant and heartbreakingly innocent, as though the whole world was in on her joke.
She remembers Emily drawing in the back seat of the car, and teasing her younger brother, and the sound of her soft-spoken voice. She recalls with a smile her love of being active in the outdoors: Emily was 'always on a swing, always in a pool.'

"That’s how #EmilyPike’s family remembers her. But for many in her tribe and across Arizona, she is known for something else: Being the victim of a savage crime.

"Last year Emily – a 14-year-old member of the #SanCarlosApache tribe – went missing from her group home in #MesaAZ, an eastern suburb of #PhoenixAZ. Her dismembered body was discovered by hikers nearly three weeks later and around 70 miles away, stuffed into trash bags left by the side of a rural highway.

"A multi-pronged investigation by federal and tribal authorities, with the support of the #FBI, has seemingly stalled. And a year later Emily’s family is still left waiting, desperately, for justice.
But her grisly killing underscores a broader problem: an epidemic of violence against #NativeAmericanWomen and girls who go missing or are killed at a staggeringly high rate.

"Native people were reported missing more than 10,200 times in 2024, according to the latest available FBI data: a rate of 28 missing person cases a day, or more than one an hour. Over 7,000 of those cases involved children, and more than 4,000 involved girls.

"This is a crisis hidden in plain sight, campaigners and tribal leaders say. In 2023, homicide was the fourth-leading cause of death for Native American men under the age of 45, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the sixth-leading cause for women of the same age. And in a landmark study conducted a decade ago, more than four in five Native American women said they had experienced violence in their lifetime. "

Read more [paywall?]:
https://www.cnn.com/2026/02/13/us/emily-pike-killing-arizona

Archived version:
https://archive.ph/XhhqA

#MMIW #MMIWG #StolenSisters #MurderedSisters #MMIWGT2S #MMIWG2S #NoMoreStolenSisters #InidgenousRights #PoliceDontKeepUsSafe #WhoKeepsUsSafe #MurderedAndMissingIndigenosuWomen

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D-bLZKDjLFw

This song is from over a decade ago....I will never forget when I first heard it at a social work conference. Everyone knows I don't cry easily, or normally at all.
When I heard this song, I just started weeping, itwas like an autonomic response.
It's also so tragic that our women are still not safe.
In memory of all our stolen sisters, sending love to all the families and communities that desperately miss them.

#mmiwg2s #stolensisters #indigenous

From 2019:

#BlackfeetNation to host first-ever Murdered and Missing
#IndigenousWomen tribunal in the U.S.

Posted on September 26, 2019 Last Read Indians, via #CensoredNews

#MMIW tribunal to be held at the Blackfeet Community College in Browning, Montana the weekend of October 4-5 [2019]

"'This is not just a Blackfeet or #Montana tribes’ tragedy, it is an #IndianCountry tragedy, and a national and international disgrace. This is a multi-generational epidemic the federal government has done nothing to address – even less than the #CanadianGovernment – which was found to be complicit in ‘deliberate race, identity and gender-based genocide’ by its own National Inquiry into MMIW,' said Chairman Tim Davis of the Blackfeet Nation. "

"'The Blackfeet Nation is uniquely positioned to host this first of its kind MMIW tribunal in the lower-48 states. The Blackfeet Tribe (Amskapi Pikuni), a member of the Blackfoot Confederacy along with its three sister tribes – the #Piikani, #Blood and #Siksika, located in #AlbertaCanada, stands in solidarity in combatting the issue of MMIW (MMIP) in Indian country. “The truth is that we live in a country whose laws and institutions perpetuate violations of basic human and Indigenous rights. These violations amount to nothing less than the deliberate, often covert campaign of genocide against Indigenous women, girls, and 2SLGBTQQIA people,' wrote Chief Commissioner Marion Buller in Reclaiming Power and Place, the final report of Canada’s National Inquiry into Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women and Girls published on June 3, 2019.

“'We are not divided by the border we are united in our grief. Many women and children stolen from our communities are trafficked back and forth between the US and Canada,' explained Chairman Davis.
Tribal members constitute seven percent of Montana’s population, but the state identifies some 26 percent of missing persons as Native American. Available evidence suggests that may be a low estimate. Last year’s Urban Indian Health Institute Report identified Montana as the state with the fifth highest incidence of MMIW cases. Billings, which had the same disturbing ranking among cities, is a known-hub on the I-90 corridor through #CrowNation, #Cheyenne and #LakotaDakota country to Minnesota, along which indigenous women and children are trafficked into sex slavery. The western 'track' runs from Missoula to Seattle, Washington. As of spring 2019, Montana had not submitted any MMIW data to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 'For those abducted into sex-slavery, the I-90 corridor is a second #HighwayOfTears, said Chairman Davis, drawing a comparison to the infamous highway in #BritishColumbia cited in #ReclaimingPowerAndPlace."

Read more:
https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2019/10/blackfeet-nation-to-host-first-ever.html

#ReaderSupportedNews #MMIWG #StolenSisters

Stolen Sisters Podcast

Case 19: ANTHONETTE CAYEDITO
https://open.spotify.com/episode/5CqY9ZjIuOgH58yLz6hhmw?si=EgfvrLb-QP-Qp7iyWwrEWw&utm_source=copy-link…

now: https://youtu.be/bXYn-XSf4Jc

#MMIWG #MMIW #STOLENSISTERS #NOMORESTOLENSISTERS #NOTINVISIBLE #ANTHONETTECAYEDITO