June 6, 2026 • 59 mins
Jamie Lee is a Native American kidnapping survivor whose story gives insight into the scores of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and the hardships they endure getting support. This conversation includes support organizations as well as other helpful tools that give insight into this heartbreaking issue.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Broadcasting from the Hip Hop Weekly Studios. I'd like to
welcome you to another episode of Civic Cipher, where our
mission is to foster allyship empathy and understanding. Big shout
out to ke Ward, who is taking some time with
the family today. But have no fear. I am in
the studio. I got by the name Rams's Jah, and
it is business as usual around here. In fact, today
(00:22):
is a special day, and I think we're going to
just start off right at the beginning. Trust me when
I say I have a story for you. On April fourteenth,
twenty twenty one, Jamie Johnson went missing after a house
party in Farmington, New Mexico. She was a thirty nine
year old Native American woman, brown hair, brown eyes, five
to two. In twenty twenty four and twenty twenty five,
(00:44):
the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Relatives crisis was
a severe underreported issue, with ten two hundred and forty
eight missing Indigenous person reports filed with the FBI in
twenty twenty four, of which five six hundred and fourteen
were women. Homicide was among the top five leading causes
of death for Ai slash An women aged ten to
(01:04):
twenty four and ninety five percent of cases often lack
media coverage. Today, we welcome to the show Jamie Johnson,
one such individual who was reported as a missing or
murdered Indigenous woman. So welcome to the show.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Hi, so.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Full disclosure. You and I we know each other. We
go back some years, and I appreciate you coming on
the show today because if I'm honest, there are a
lot of issues that affect Native communities. This is probably
one of the most gut wrenching and heartbreaking, and we
(01:48):
have done our best to try to reach out to
get people from different tribes to come up and tell
their stories and share their experiences. Because on this show
we foster allyship. We connect the communities of people who
want to see changes made in the world to people
who can explain what changes need to be made. And
(02:11):
you coming up today is an exceptional act of bravery.
And I know that it's a lift, but people need
to know about what's going on, because if they don't know,
they don't know how to help. And so I applaud
you for taking the time to try to make the
world a better place for your people and for all people.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
I thank you for that. Yeah, we go way back
but I know this is like actually like a little
bit troubling for me because it's not something I really
speak about. I think for me on my standpoint, I
felt like this can happen to me, Like I read
about all time, I see things even previously. I can
(02:56):
say like the week before, we were like like laughingly
joking even on social media, like.
Speaker 3 (03:03):
If I go missing, you better not put my weight down.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Things like that. And the fact that I remember that
and we were like are like childhood friends. We were
joking about that, and the fact like not knowing seriously
the next week I went missing. Sure, And it's not
something like at the time was kind of like, you know,
(03:28):
you want to think that would happen, And even me
to this day, I wouldn't think I'd be one of
those people on a missing poster or like being out
there known as a missing person, this missing girl, and
even more so like I was on like the murdered
(03:52):
missing Indigenous women, and I think that's like a big
thing for me.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
Sure, Sure, Well, before we get into your story, and
you know we're gonna we're gonna take this very slow.
You know, this is a friendly place. We love you,
and I recognize that a lot of people lean into
stories like this because they want you to take them
into your trauma, because they want to consume it. That
(04:19):
is not this place. This is a connection of how
does this happen? Why does this happen? Who does this
happen too? And that we've found in our travels Q
and myself that the best way to do that is
to have people tell them stories, tell their stories themselves.
I could do my best to tell your story, but
(04:40):
I would not have the same It doesn't come with
the same emotional weight. And so again I want to
commend you know your bravery. I recognize the tears. And
we haven't even gotten to.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
The stream part.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
So we'll put a pin in it. We'll come back
when the time is right. In the short run, what
I want to do is share a little bit of statistics.
I want to paint a picture. This is for our listeners,
and then you know, we'll baby steps. We'll get there,
you know. So these are some key missing and murdered
(05:12):
Indigenous women's statistics and trends as of twenty twenty five. Again,
six and fourteen reports involved Indigenous women in twenty twenty four,
with a significant portion being under age eighteen, data remains
fragmented due to poor record keeping, systemic racial misclassification, and
jurisdictional confusion between tribal, federal, and local law enforcement. In
(05:36):
terms of violence rates, over fifty six percent of Indigenous
women have experienced sexual violence and fifty five and a
half percent have experienced physical violence by an intimate partner.
In terms of geographic focus, of the ten states with
the highest rates of missing persons cases in twenty twenty five,
these include Arkansas, Arizona, Oklahoma, Washington, New Mexico, California, Montana,
(05:59):
North Carolina, southdak Coda in Texas, all places obviously with
statistically significant, relatively speaking populations of Indigenous peoples. In terms
of unsolved cases, the BIA estimates roughly four thy two
hundred unsolved missing and murdered cases, though this is likely
an undercount. And while we're here, you know, I saw
(06:21):
a movie about this just might have been And I
have to find the name of the movie, but I
know it stars the guy that plays I'm not good
at this, but I think he's the guy that shoot.
I can't I can't think of his name, but you
know the woman that plays.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
Yeah, the Yellowstone.
Speaker 1 (06:43):
Maybe that's it. Maybe that's it, but you know it.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
Kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
Yes, that's it, that's it, that's perfect. So I'm gonna
look that up, I know, but because people need to
know about it. But when I saw this again, it's
It's another one of those things that gives some insight
into this. One of the things that we've been trying
to do on the show is help people reframe the
conversations that they end up having in their homes with
(07:06):
their families, with their racist uncles and you know, at
work around the water coolers about the plight of marginalized communities.
I think there is this assumption in this baby of
a country that the way things are is the way
they've always been and the way they always should be,
(07:27):
certainly in conservative circles. And one of the things that
I like to do to remind, you know, people is
to bring the data into the conversations that they end
up having. The truth of the matter is that this
country is approximately two hundred and fifty years old. You
can tack on however much you want to, you know,
to that number, if you want to include the times
(07:48):
when this was the colony of Great Britain, and you know,
whatever all the rest of that nonsense. But the fact
is is that this is a baby of a country.
You know, you compare to a place like China, It's
been around for like five thousand years. This is just
a blip on the radar. And when you look at
the populations of Native peoples that have been on this land,
(08:09):
it goes back somewhere in the neighborhood twenty thousand years.
So this is the land of Native people. And it's
not until we start to see and again that movie
paints the picture quite a bit better, but you see
(08:30):
that sense of entitlement. You see the lack of care
and precision when it comes to native issues, and you
recognize almost like the arrogance of this country insofar as
native populations are concerned, and all marginalized population populations historically speaking.
(08:50):
But there is this stunning silence that I found occurs
when you start talking about issues that relate to native populations.
Q and I we did an episode. This has been
a couple of years since we've done it now, but
I remember going through a lot of the data of
how disproportionately is affected its affecting native populations. Native populations
(09:18):
don't have access to that you know, that sort of thing, right,
And when you look at how you know it's it's
often you know, white, straight, heterosexual, you know, Christian males
that are at kind of the top of every list
(09:39):
that is good, and if they're on the top of
a list that's bad, it's often underreported. For example, you
know one of the things when it talks about sexual predators,
sexual devians, child predators, that sort of thing, that's a
list where you tend to find white men very heavily
represented on lists like that. However, that doesn't really make
for sexy hea and so it's underreported, right Yeah. And
(10:05):
you know, again, you don't really get to a place
like this unless there are systemic issues. And so when
we get into the data, and I do have more
data to share, I want to make sure that you know,
we talk about this in terms and we frame it
in terms of this is not strictly speaking, the responsibility
(10:27):
of native populations, because that's what they like to do
with black people. You know, you guys need to stop
listening to rap music and get off welfare and stop
being lazy and all that sort of stuff, and those
are convenient excuses, and they'll find these fringe examples to
support those excuses, but the data simply shows otherwise, and
this systemic issues are well pronounced in society, and they
(10:48):
turn a blind eye to that. So I want to
make sure that we're in front of that because people
might have a tendency to try to blame these problems
on native populations themselves. And I remember when we went
through this the first time, Q and myself, that's simply
not true. This is a population that is continually exploited,
often enough by those same heterosexual, Christian white men. Again
(11:12):
in that movie, and I'll look that up in just
a second, but that movie really gives some insight into it. Now,
that movie is a movie, and as far as I know,
it is a work of fiction that is based.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
On actual events.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
It was actual, right, But it's a movie. So no
matter even if it is even if it was a documentary,
it's still told through the lens of a crew of
people that are trying to get a story out there.
The story that you have I think really really, at
least for me, it kind of took me right into
(11:49):
what that experience looks like and what it feels like
to go through that. And I think that the human
being and me and all of us really connects with
stories like that. I know that I'm going to carry
that story with me forever, and my hope is that
our listeners will do the same. Before we get there,
I've been teasing it for a long time. I'm going
(12:10):
to circle back to this because one of the things
that I like to do on this show, when and
if I can, is give people some information that they
can use to make changes or be the changes that
they want to see. So I'm going to go through
this once now and then after we're done talking. So
first up, what can you do? So take this website
(12:34):
down indianlaw dot org. Indianlaw dot Org. I'll say it
again at the end, and I'm going to share a
bit from their website. It is outrageous that the vast
majority of these women never see their abusers or rapists
brought to justice. An unworkable race based criminal jurisdictional scheme
created by the United States has limited ability. So I
(12:56):
limited the ability of Indian nations to protect Native of
women from violence to provide them with meaningful remedies. For
more than thirty five years, United States law has stripped
Indian nations of all criminal authority over non Indians. As
a result, until recent changes in the law, Indian nations
were unable to prosecute non Indians, who reportedly commit the
(13:16):
vast majority, or ninety six percent, of sexual violence against
Native women. The Census Bureau reports that non Indians now
comprise seventy six percent of the population on tribal lands
and sixty eight percent of the population in Alaska Native villages.
Many Native women have married non Indians. However, it is
(13:37):
unacceptable that a non Indian who chooses to marry a
Native woman, live on her reservation and commit acts of
domestic violence against her cannot be criminally prosecuted by an
Indian nation, and more often than not, will never be
prosecuted by any government. Again. The website we want you
to visit is indianlaw dot org. There's places where you
(13:58):
can get information, statistics, and obviously you can make a
contribution or you know, make an impact in your community
wherever you are in the country listening to our show. So,
Jamie Johnson, when we first spoke, you told me about,
you know, this party in Farmington, New Mexico, which I
never even knew that you had gone to New Mexico,
(14:19):
so you know, take us through this.
Speaker 2 (14:21):
Yeah, my family predominantly, like they're all from farming to
New Mexico, Like I mean like a little outskirts of
New Mexico, like on private land. I've always grown up there.
I was like I actually I moved away when I
was a kid.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
You moved from there from there here, you trusted everybody there.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
My mom was like young mom too as well.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
I have to give her always, like all my love
and everything because like the same thing with like if
you look at tribal lands, like my dad passed away
when I was two, and this what it kind of
comes down to that because my mom was young and
(15:07):
she was with my dad. I remember how I used
to feel, and I remember not knowing things. So, like
my dad passed away when I was two. He got
shot in our backyard. And it did take three days
before the police came out there because it came down
to jurisdictions. Checkerboard area. Oh that's not our land. Go
(15:31):
check with crawmpoint. This is ship Rock land. Oh, this
is FBI. So before anything was even done, like anybody
went out there, it was three days later. And so
there's a lot of things that I guess jurisdictions where
you are, what land it's on, actually comes down to
(15:53):
who will come for help, because you can actually even
call you call like the Devil Police Department, and more
than likely they won't show up. At the most I
would say, like two hours after the fact, or if
even that two days later, or they may not show
up at all. That's just common, okay, really common. And
(16:18):
I don't know if you look back on things like
there's like missing children and that's how they come up
with like the Turquoise law, and even growing up there.
I mean I moved back there after I had my son,
and I remember that girl like Ashlyn Mike.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
I don't know if you looked her up.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
She I remember driving back to work and I remember
seeing all these police cars. This guy got apprehended because
he's the one who actually killed her, like everybody's looking
out for her. They found her dead, like she was everything.
Nothing was put out there till like way later to
(17:05):
where that's why they started trying to change the laws
of things, so like it's not just like my story,
it's more like everybody else's story as well. This is
what I'm trying to put awareness to So for the
fact that we're even talking about this is like a
big thing because I even have a friend his little
brother's missing too as well, and they found yeah, and
(17:32):
they all they found was his hand, his hand, separate hand.
And I know plenty of people back there in New Mexico, Farmington,
even one of my cousins he's still missing and he's
from here in the valley, you know, from ASA, and
his name was Hector, and they still haven't found him
(17:55):
as well.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
So it's not like just like me. It's the fact.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
That I know so many people and this is like
within the native community, which actually like the fact that
I'm here, I guess I wasn't. I can't say like
this is something that I wanted to do. I mean
not saying, but it's it impacts me. It impacts a
(18:22):
lot of people. And I think the fact that I
know so many people on the spectrum to be in
the situation that I am, and I can say I
know several people too who went missing and they were
fround deceased, they're not no longer here. So for me
(18:47):
being here, I guess it's there's a lot of different possibilities.
So after the fact of that I had to. I
literally moved away, which I understand. Like my mom, she
went through a lot too.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
And so this is before you went missing or after
missing it.
Speaker 3 (19:04):
After I went missing, I was there.
Speaker 2 (19:08):
So if I really want to get down to it,
before I had barely moved back, like I was, I
was in a relationship. I was with my Max. Me
and him were together for twenty four years, and when
I finally left him, I was like, it was the
same thing ongoing. I mean, we had some really great time,
(19:31):
so I'm not going to say anything about the bad,
but I finally left him, and I really looked at
it to be like, you know what, I was with
you twenty four years. That was my dad's lifetime twenty
four years. And I feel like we've already went through
(19:53):
the positive part, Like we've already went through our good
times in our lifetime. And if I was with you
for my dad's whole lifetime, there's another life, Like I mean,
there's more to it. I always wanted us, I guess.
So you can say, like, you know how, like I
(20:13):
guess it comes back to the whole thing. You want
a mom and a dad in your family. Yeah, so
that's what me and him wanted for our son. My
son was twenty, he had already graduated. So when I
actually took the step to leave, I did leave, and it's.
Speaker 3 (20:35):
Kind of like pushed down on me to be like.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
You left and then he went missing, like if you're
with me, you know, if you're back with him or
if you were No, no, I'm saying that's what people
would you missing, So like, oh he kept you know,
so I got a lot of backlash on the back end.
(20:59):
That's why we moved from Yeah, I left, so I
went back to New Mexico. Honestly, like what I was
going through when I actually went back to New Mexico,
it was a week after I lost my grandma, you know,
like they always say, like nobody loves you more than
your mom's mom, you know. So I was going through
(21:19):
all that and it was kind of like I'm not
going to go into detail about me and him, but
like I did leave, and when I went missing was
about it was four months after I had left, Okay.
Speaker 1 (21:36):
So so yeah, so talk us through how that happens,
because I think that for a lot of people you
think of missing like missing children, yes, yeah, and a
child might be easy for a child to go missing
because they might run off and might lose them at
a Disneyland or theme park something like that. For adults,
you know, those of us that live in real populated cities,
(21:59):
if someone's missing, typically it's because they ran away, right,
so they want to be missing. But there's this this
idea I think that people getting snatched off the streets.
It could happen, and people do live in fear of that.
But I think if people kind of are sober in
their minds, they recognize that that that probably only happens
in the movies. You know that you don't know anybody
(22:20):
that's got snatched off the street, and you know what
I mean, So it might be hard for people to
understand how or why this happens. So you know, you're
at a party. One night, I was at a party
that I remember.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
That it was like it wasn't a party I just
went to, like well, like I had this group of
friends who were like yeah, I mean they were like
they weren't friends that I really hung out with, but
I did get to know, like we hang out like daily,
like I mean, because I kind of like I would
The life that I had prior was like they labeled
(22:55):
me as you know, oh that so and so's wife.
That's so and so so. You know. So this was
my first time actually being out because I never used
to be out. I would never do anything. I would
I am more or less. Was just I was a mom,
That's what it was. And for me being at this party,
(23:16):
the last thing I remember is like, oh, yeah, let's
take some shots and not thinking anything of it. I
remember being handed the shot. That's the last thing like
what I recall of everything, and like oh, cheers, you know,
(23:37):
and that's it. And everybody asked me like what do
you remember. I'm like, there's a little bit of bits
and pieces that I kind of but it's like a puzzle,
like I remember. I don't want to say a minute
of things. But in between there, I don't recall a
(24:03):
lot of things like at all.
Speaker 1 (24:04):
Okay, so you were at a party, you took a show.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
And yeah, but after the after everything I did get
like toxicology reports and I did have to go. So
I actually woke up in a cabin in Colorado, so
I can't say like, well, I was in Farmington, this
(24:29):
is where I took the shot.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Okay, Farmington in Mexico, yes.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
And then I woke up in Colorado.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
Okay, how long between when you took that shot and
you woke up?
Speaker 3 (24:40):
Five days? Five days?
Speaker 1 (24:42):
It was, so you're missing five days where you just
have bits.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
And pieces, bits and pieces, That's what it was. And
I honestly, when I ever, everybody asked me that, like
how what made you wake up? Finally, and I go,
it's gonna sound like ridiculous, but yeah, I heard my
(25:10):
grandma saying wake up. But so like native way, she
called me what she always calls me, and I'm not
gonna say that, but she woke me up and.
Speaker 3 (25:18):
She was like, what are you doing? Get up? Don't
let the sun see you sleeping.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
You need to get up because as Native people, that's
what you say, Like that's just like, get up. You're
supposed to do something, make yourself productive if you're not
supposed to just stay sleeping. Honestly, that's the way. You're
supposed to rise with the sun, go down with the sun.
That's just something.
Speaker 3 (25:40):
And I used to ask her that all the time,
like what does that mean? Why do you always say that?
Speaker 2 (25:44):
Like I mean, because you know, you kind of grow
up like wanting to sleep in and that was the thing.
It was like you wake up when the sun comes up,
and I say, I can say I didn't like it
at the time, because of course you want to sleep
in But that's what I remember her saying, and every
time I went to her, how I loved being at
(26:05):
my grandma's house. I loved being at my grandparents like
all together. And she'd always say that, And I guess
that's like how you think about things, like going back
to your childhood, little things they made you do. It
was like tedious at the time, but like those are
your best memories, you know, that's.
Speaker 1 (26:25):
What got you out of that.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
So so you wake up you're in a cabin in
it well, obviously you don't know you're in another state.
Speaker 2 (26:33):
I didn't. I didn't know I were I was. I
honestly looked outside. I looked around the cabins empty up
there was like I remember being like, there was a
bed because I woke up, of course in red and
there was chair. There was a living room. Like I
walked around nobody was there. Nobody. I looked outside. There
(26:55):
was no rides, no nothing.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
Is this like a city or is this no?
Speaker 2 (27:00):
This is literally remotely in the middle of nowhere, Like
I looked around like thinking, okay, there's no there's no phone.
I didn't have anything. I remember thinking like what do
I do? Like I didn't even know, Like honestly, I
(27:23):
thought it was like mid afternoon, but it was from
after everything. It was like early morning. I thought it
was middle afternoon. I thought I was wild. There was
a road it was not paved. I remember walking down
(27:43):
and I was I felt like I was going in circles.
I was literally walking around in circles, trying to get
down this hill like this, and I don't want to
say hill because it was literally in the mountains, trees, everything,
it was so much, so many trees that you couldn't
(28:05):
really tell what part of the day it was. You can
see a part of the sky, but not all of
the sky. That makes sense. So I remember walking down
and walking and I was just like, you know what,
let me just go straight through. I'm not walking around.
This winding road is taking forever. I didn't know how
(28:26):
far I was going to go. I walked for hours,
and this was like April, so in that time, like
the area I'm in, there's a lot of wind. It's
kind of still chilly, it's still kind of cold.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
It's do you have enough clothes?
Speaker 2 (28:48):
No? Actually, so when I went missing, I wasn't thinking
I'm going to be out anywhere, so I was kind
of like still in my sleeping clothes. So I had
like shrap pants. Of course it's so cold. I had
like like I biked a lot, so like my little
biker my biker shorts, and I had to pull over
on a pullover.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
Well, real quick, how how long do you think you
walked from the cabin to where you found some civilization?
How long was that?
Speaker 2 (29:18):
I would have to say about three four hours maybe
of walking? Yes, okay, all right, no water, no nothing,
so like I tried to see no cars passed me,
nobody were like nobody was it was a remote road.
There was nobody even around.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Okay, well, let's do this. I want to talk about
maybe what the response was, you know, once you did
find some help. In just a second, but let's take
a pause for some commercials, and we're gonna come back
with more with Jamie Johnson and our episode on missing
and murdered Indigenous women. In just a second, keep on
(30:02):
riding with us as we continue to broadcast a balance
and defend the discourse from these hip hop weekly studios.
Welcome back to Civic Cipher. I'm your host, ramses Jah.
You rejoin us with a special guest in the studio
and if you weren't able to hear the first half
of the program. On April fourteen, twenty twenty one, Jamie
Johnson went missing after a house party in Farmington, New Mexico.
(30:24):
She was a thirty nine year old naive American woman,
brown hair, brown eyes, five two. She was reported as
a missing or murdered Indigenous woman and she is here
with us telling her story. So when we last left off,
you had taken a shot at a party or a
(30:46):
gathering will call it, because it wasn't really a party,
and you woke up five or six days later, some
five days later a cabin in a different state. So
now you're in Colorado, Colorado. You don't remember what happened
(31:07):
in between, just bits and pieces.
Speaker 2 (31:09):
Like yeah, little bits of memory, Okay, Like I remember
briefly I would say like.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
I'm sure you needed water, food, something like that.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
I can't even recall of me doing like I mean,
of course, because there's a lot of things I don't know,
you know.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Okay, But yes. So when you finally do come to
you're in one piece. Thank god. You walk around this
cabin in a remote area, there's no one there. You're
in the cabin on your own. You go outside, you
(31:51):
don't see anyone. You don't know where you are. There's
woods and trees all around you. And you see it,
maybe a dirt road or a gravel roads.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
Yeah, it's a road to get up to the place
where I was at.
Speaker 1 (32:04):
So now you're walking down the mountain and you walk
for you said how many hours?
Speaker 2 (32:10):
I would say about I would say about a good
round four hours.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
Fours out of where you were before you were able
to get some help. So what happens then?
Speaker 2 (32:21):
So I went walking. I finally see a paved road.
When I see the paved road, I was like, let
me just walk on here. I don't know what's going
to happen. And honestly, I did not know where I
was at at all. Like I couldn't look around and
be like, oh, this is where I'm at, you know,
(32:42):
I didn't know nothing. So I just walked along the road,
and I could say I walked for quite a while,
and I was just like, you know what, I have
to hitch hike. I don't know where I'm at, and
car passed me. The third car that finally finally passed me,
(33:06):
he passed me, not knowing that it was a hymn
and he even had a trailer. He went past me,
and like I'm telling you, I don't know how far
I walked that there was only three rides that I've seen.
He turned around after me, game me. He turned around
(33:26):
nothing after me, but he turned around so like me,
not even knowing where I was at, I was kind
of scared. Sure, I was like, and he goes, hey,
he goes I can't even recall his name. He was
a sweet older gentleman and an older white guy, and
(33:46):
he goes, hey, my name. I can't even remember his name,
but he's like, are you okay? And I go do
you have a phone? And he goes yeah, and he goes,
I went past you. And it was kind of more
scary for me because I seen the ride go past me.
Of course you're gonna notice a truck with a trailer,
(34:12):
and the fact that the trailer came back around, and
so it kind of scared me a bit. But this
guy was a sweetheart who was a sweetheart to this day,
I can say like, oh my god, thank you so much,
because I remember he had him. He's like, I'm not
into technology. I'm not like this. And he had a
(34:34):
flip phone. And this was back like twenty twenty one.
He had a flip phone. Still, He's all, yeah, I
call who he can. I called my boyfriend. He was
like what, and I go he answered right away, and
I was like hey, and he's like, oh my gosh.
It's funny because he calls me the mosse. He's always
(34:56):
like moose. I was like, I'm over here, I said,
and I had to ask him. I said, where are
we at. He's all said the mile marker, this and that.
I mean, I don't I don't know. I didn't know
where it was. And he goes, it's about an hour
to the state line of Colorado. And my friends like,
(35:19):
I can meet you there. Yeah, we'll be there. So
he had to call. I guess he called the detective.
The detective was like, make sure it's her, because we
can't take her off the radar to make sure it's her.
Because at the time it was five days later. Everybody
said like usually if they're not found within three days,
(35:40):
more than likely they're deceased. And he called my mom,
he called my cousin Carlton, he called like you know,
he called several of the Hey, they said they she called me.
They're like, well, we got to make sure it's her.
So I talked to this man who actually was the
(36:04):
guy who picked me up. I can say, like, you know,
here's my favorite. It's funny because we had this nice
conversation and he was out of small world. He actually
knew who my boyfriend was. Like, oh, he came out
here to fix some windows because however needs to do
doors and windows and stuff. And he goes, yeah, I
(36:27):
know him. So he was like, I probably have him
on my phone. You know, if you look back in
the history, you know, it was kind of that. So
we talked and he goes, this guy was like, you
need some I know, he said he he used to
do equipment. He had equipment that he used to rent out,
so he was We had a nice conversation. Anyways, Besides that,
(36:52):
he took me to the state line.
Speaker 3 (36:54):
He gave me water.
Speaker 2 (36:56):
I remember drinking like three things of water just right away,
and he was like, do you want food? He even
asked me that too, Like small town guy, and he
was like, you want to I'm like, no, let me
just get there. And I get there to the state line,
(37:18):
they were already there waiting I had. There was like
a police escort. There was my boyfriend and there was
my cousin and they were just sitting there waiting for me.
So I said thank you to the older man who
helped me, and he told me that too, he goes,
(37:40):
I passed by you, and I did pass by you,
he goes. I went down the road and something was
like this girl does not belong here, like something's wrong,
something's off, he goes. I drove a few miles out,
he goes. I had to turn right back around, and
(38:03):
I'm so glad I did, and he goes. I did
not think that, but something in my heart told me
to turn back around, he goes. If I had not
turned back around, that was something that would have bothered
me the rest of my life. And I just give
him a big hugs. So thank you so much for
turning back around for me. And oh the fact that
(38:28):
I think it bothered me that, like I didn't know
where I was at. There's like the road was there.
Once I got to the main road, there was a
right way to left way, and I took the left
way because I was just like, I don't know, I
was trying to I was looking at the sun, like
(38:50):
trying to like I could finally be to where I
could kind of see the sun. And I think just
me navigating, trying to figure out. And all I was
ever told was like you just keep walking, you keep going,
you know, you keep pushing forward. And at that time
(39:12):
I wasn't talking to my son. My son wasn't talking
to me because I left his dad, so like there
was so much in my life. There was like I
have to push forward, you know, I have to keep going.
And that's what I did, and I'm grateful for the
(39:33):
people who were there right away. After I got picked up,
I went to they picked me up, and they didn't
make the call to the police department. Yes it's her,
And then the police were like, well, bring her, escort
her in, come to the police station. We want to
make sure it's her. Before they took off my missing
(39:56):
poster and everything. So we went to the police department
and I can't even recall the detectives. He was really
nice and once he's seen me, he hugged me too,
and he goes, you know what, I honestly look through
(40:17):
your social media because if you look at my social media,
you can see like my videos of me just biking,
having fun and just being me. And he goes and it.
Speaker 3 (40:29):
Was just like.
Speaker 2 (40:31):
This girl's all full of life and the fact that
she's missing. He was like, I went home too, and
it kind of it bothered me. It really bothered me.
So the same thing. And it came down to being
like jurisdictions as well, Okay, you cross borders. You were
(40:57):
in New Mexico and then you went you were fun
in Colorado, so I had Colorado people call it like
officers as well, and the same with Farmington. And I
honestly didn't know that many days had passed. I didn't
(41:19):
know what day it was. And the officer told me that.
He was like, you're lucky where you were found. There
was a another younger guy who was found dead the
(41:41):
same where I was walking through the forest. They said
he was found dead in the forest, missing for about
two months or so. So they were like, they asked me,
if will you come to trial once it comes down
to it, you know, But like I was, yeah, okay,
(42:03):
I'll say my story, but it never came down to that.
But the got I.
Speaker 3 (42:12):
Mean, like.
Speaker 2 (42:13):
I don't know if it's just like the vast majority
of things. Meaning he just asked me that if I
was able to come, if it came down to me
actually seeing my set of the story on a trial,
but it never got down to that. So years have
passed and every year that time I kind of get
(42:38):
a lot of anxiety. And this year I actually was
like five years and I can see my life now
from then. It's totally different. You know, I had to
change a lot of things in my life. But like
every year it's like that that day comes about, and
(43:02):
I think this year made it. Oh, it made it different,
just because it's five years. I can reflect upon myself,
like how I am now the people who were in
my life then I'm not saying like nobody's bad, but
like they're not a part of my life.
Speaker 3 (43:22):
And like there are so many people who are.
Speaker 2 (43:25):
Gone since that time.
Speaker 1 (43:27):
You know, gone from your life.
Speaker 2 (43:29):
I mean gone in general, they're they're deceased. I think
this year was actually a reflection on myself to be
like I've come this far and this is something that
I don't even I don't even put out there because
(43:50):
when I was found, I came back and this is
a small community.
Speaker 3 (43:56):
Small.
Speaker 2 (43:57):
I mean it's there's nowhere in the millions or anything
like that, but it's so small that you know, somebody
who knows somebody, like it's all come together, Like you
can pick up the newspaper somebody who was on the
front page somehow, you know somebody there, you know, you like,
(44:18):
it's that's how small it is. Well, when I came back,
it was like a lot of people pointing at me like, hey,
that's a girl. You know, that's amazing girl, you know.
And I think that was the hardest part for me,
was people just point and it was just like it's
(44:43):
just not even that. It was just more like, well
look how she looks like she's you know, probably her
own fault she went missing. You know, there was a
lot of things on that spectrum to be like like
I felt like, I mean that might just be my
(45:04):
opinion on things, but I felt like I was a
ridicule for me being missing when I was grateful for
even being back because that's how small it.
Speaker 1 (45:19):
Was, you know, if I may so, the people that
were present at the party or the gathering, yes, where
you took the shot and then you don't remember anything
after taking the shot. Did the police whatevere, whatever jurisdiction,
did they get a chance to talk to those folks
(45:41):
A and then B. Were those folks like willing to
work with the police to try to figure out who
might have been responsible or who might have been the
last person to see you?
Speaker 3 (45:52):
I think too well.
Speaker 2 (45:53):
I mean I talked to several people, and yeah they were,
but it was very So it came down to the
whole thing of like everybody here should have taken a
drug test as well to see because kind of in
my situation was when I actually took my toxicology group,
(46:19):
it was I had I was drug There was so
many things like in my system. So they asked the
people who were there to take the same thing if
they can't recollect everything that went on, But they had
the no, it's no, I don't know what everything was,
(46:40):
but no they didn't. So it came down to that.
I mean, it wasn't like a big gather. I mean
it was a gathering, but it wasn't Nothing was really
done to that point, and everybody did kind of like, okay,
(47:01):
this is what I remember, this is what was and
but yeah, that's that's as far as But yeah, and
I do have to I had a friend, my boyfriend,
and he had a friend. They were literally and again
(47:22):
with the police up. They were like going door to
door like do you know do you remember her? I know,
you have to, and they were looking for me. And
if I didn't have these people in my life, and
even the police officers told me, if you didn't have
(47:43):
a following on social media or anything like that, you
probably wouldn't be here because I had so many people
spreading my like missing my my friend. I had a
good friend, my friend, and she was the one who
even posted on my Facebook and was like where are you?
Speaker 3 (48:05):
You're always?
Speaker 2 (48:06):
Also, you haven't called me because like every day I
always I have my people who I call regularly, like always,
and I stopped calling in The funny thing about is
everybody's like, wow, how is that even possible?
Speaker 3 (48:25):
Like the day before I had a barbecue and.
Speaker 2 (48:30):
Me being me, I love dogs and there was our
dog fell in the canal and there was tarpa on
the side. I went in to try to save this
dog and my phone had slipped out, so they were
actually like, where's your phone? The last place is crazy
(48:50):
because where we were, my phone ended up being along
the stream, and it was in beyond how Point, I forget,
a small little town, and they were like, oh, yeah,
we found her phone. So it was kind of like
you found her phone.
Speaker 1 (49:07):
But oh so your phone was found, yes, somewhere else.
You're found in Colorado? Yeah, well how about this? The
reason that that I asked that question, and of course
this has been some years since this happened to you,
But the reason I asked that question is because I
would guess, like I'm sure most people would guess, Well,
(49:27):
if you're found at an abandoned cabin five days after
you've gone missing, and the police know that this is
an issue that is quite pronounced in native communities on
tribal lands, that sort of thing, and there was another
boy who had gone missing for two months and his
(49:49):
body was found in approximately the same area, then what
you're seeing is the beginnings of a pattern, you know,
I mean, and getting as much information from the people
at that party would make the most sense in the
(50:10):
world to ensure that a third or fourth or fifth
missing or murdered Indigenous person I guess in this case
doesn't occur, and so that's where that question comes from.
Before we come back to it, I do want to
take a moment, as promised, because again, this entire episode
(50:32):
is intended to bring people into one of these stories
so that they can understand how easily it can happen. Obviously,
you never saw that coming, you know. I know Ramses knows,
you knows me. We known each other since we were children, literally,
so I know that you are that woman on social
media who's full of life, who rides bikes, who loves dogs,
(50:54):
who's a good mom, all those things. This is what
I know to be true, So no one can tell
me any different. And it's not your fault. I mean,
you know this, but it's not your fault. You're just
a person who is living her life and you're at
a I originally thought it was a party. It wasn't
even a party, it was a gathering. And that's what
(51:15):
you do when you know, when you're on lands like
that where there's not a lot of development. Everybody you
just have community, right, and so this is kind of normal.
And you, as your grandmother said, you don't want to
let the sun catch you sleeping, right, So you get
out there and you make the most of your day,
you fellowship with your community. All this makes sense to me.
So I see a normal woman living a normal life,
(51:36):
doing what normal people do, and this can happen to her.
This happened to my friend, right, and then she has
five days that she can't remember. I don't want to
take anyone there. This is why I haven't asked you
what do you remember about those five days? Because I
don't imagine you remember much. That's happy, but you know
(52:02):
you came back alive, and that's really the part of
this story that kind of provides a little bit of hope.
But I'd imagine with more resources, people can you know,
fortify these folks. If people knew this was a problem,
people can fortify these folks who are doing their best
to push back against it. And so again I want
to take a moment to revisit Indianlaw dot org. That's
(52:22):
the organization we mentioned earlier if you want to get
more information or learn how to help, how to be supportive,
how to push back, just how to be an ally
in this space. There's another one that I do want
to share. This is ni WRC dot org. This stands
for National Indigenous Woman's Resource Center. I want to say again, Ini,
(52:47):
do WRC dot org and I'll say it again. If
you want to grab a pen, I'll read from their website.
The alarming reports of abduction and murder of Native women
highlight one of the most devastating issues facing tribal communities.
On some reservations, native women face murder rates more than
ten times in national average. These disappearances and murders are
often directly linked to domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, stalking,
(53:09):
sex trafficking, and long standing harms impacting Indigenous communities. Understanding
these connections is essential to addressing the crisis of missing
and murdered Indigenous women and relatives. In response to this
ongoing crisis, grassroots movements have grown at the local, regional, national,
and international levels to honor the lives of missing and
(53:29):
murdered Indigenous women and relatives and to work toward lasting
safety and support. May Fit fifth has been recognized as
the National Day of Awareness for Missing and Murdered Indigenous
Women and Relatives, honoring and a harris of twenty one
year old woman from Northern Cheyenne Tribe who went missing
and was later found murdered in twenty thirteen. Native families
advocates and tribal nations have risen to shine a light
(53:50):
on the crisis, strength and community action and uplift the
voices of surviving family members. Together, they continue to call
for visibility, support, and positive change to protect Indigenous women, girls,
relatives and relatives. Sorry, and i WRC is committed to
supporting families, communities, and advocates and bringing together awareness to
this national crisis and honoring the lives of all those
(54:10):
taken too soon. Get involved policy changes, legislative action, volunteering, donating,
and i WRC dot org again, that is National Indigenous
Women's Resource Center one more time and i WRC dot
org before we go. I know that you were telling
a long story and we have this couple of minutes left.
(54:32):
Is there anything else that you want to share with
our listeners today in terms of what they should take
from your story or anything like that.
Speaker 3 (54:42):
I think, honestly, I lived my life daily.
Speaker 2 (54:47):
I think I don't want to say, yeah, be a
wary surroundings. These weren't people who, like when I went missing,
I want to have thought I'd even go missing. So
for the fact that it happened to me, I feel
like it could happen to anyone, and it's not just
(55:08):
like in the small communities, could happen anywhere. And I
think this actually made me aware of a lot of
things because you know, you read about it, you see
about it. There's things it's put in, it's put out there,
but you always think like that's not going to happen
to me, And I am.
Speaker 3 (55:30):
It happened to me, and I'm older, Like you.
Speaker 2 (55:36):
Think you'd be like, Okay, you know a lot more,
but I'm I can't say like, don't do this, don't
do that, but honestly, be well aware. Sure, be well aware.
There are a lot of people that went missing. Like
(55:57):
I said, I can tell you like I I have
over my whole hand, I can tell you people that
I know who've went missing. I share stories all the
time on my Facebook, like of people who are missing.
It feels good to know that they're found.
Speaker 3 (56:17):
But there are.
Speaker 2 (56:17):
People who I've showed, I've shared stories with and they're
not found. And it's a big impact to know that
I I was out there, I was a person whose
story was shared like my missing person. And I've honestly
(56:40):
between these past few days, I I told a few coworkers,
like you know, just so you know. And but this
is before they even knew me, and they seen my
missing poster as well. And I actually had to go
to I when after I was found, I went back
(57:01):
to my roots. I've always wanted to see my family
in Oklahoma and everything, and I'm gonna to Oklahoma, Arkansas.
I got so much love and hugs from everybody because
they were like, I shared your story.
Speaker 3 (57:16):
Oh my god. They're like, oh my god, you're well.
Speaker 1 (57:19):
This is exactly why I want to make sure that
you know we applaud you because obviously you're surviving is
the main thing, and you know, the next big lift
of sharing your story so that we can prevent this
from happening in the future. I'm grateful to have had
life take me in this direction to be able to
build a platform where I can share it with someone
that actually know who's been through this type of trauma.
(57:42):
I applaud your bravery again. I appreciate you taking the
time to come onto the show and share that. That's
no small thing. And you know, you crying all the
way through. It is like, oh my gosh, I hope
I'm not hurting something. Oh no special to me, But
you know, we do shed tears on this show. There's
this show is we get the rare laugh but you know,
(58:06):
we deal with the real round here and sometimes that's
easier said than done. So again, I just think that
that is fantastic. So Jamie Johnson, thank you for coming
and uh and sharing your story before we let everyone
go go, we mentioned a movie earlier that kind of
(58:27):
gives a little bit of insight into what winn river. It's.
It's it's a great movie, but also it's a it's
a movie that will grow you up a bit. So
check that movie out. Yeah, and uh, you know, obviously
you can come back anytime, but for now, thank you
(58:48):
for coming up. Jamie.
Speaker 2 (58:49):
Thank you very much, I know all.
Speaker 1 (58:52):
Right, be sure to find us on all social media
at Civic Cipher that C I v I C C
I p h E R. Until next time, y'all. Peace,
Broadcasting from the Hip Hop Weekly Studios. I'd like to
welcome you to another episode of Civic Cipher, where our
mission is to foster allyship empathy and understanding. Big shout
out to ke Ward, who is taking some time with
the family today. But have no fear. I am in
the studio. I got by the name Rams's Jah, and
it is business as usual around here. In fact, today
(00:22):
is a special day, and I think we're going to
just start off right at the beginning. Trust me when
I say I have a story for you. On April fourteenth,
twenty twenty one, Jamie Johnson went missing after a house
party in Farmington, New Mexico. She was a thirty nine
year old Native American woman, brown hair, brown eyes, five
to two. In twenty twenty four and twenty twenty five,
(00:44):
the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Relatives crisis was
a severe underreported issue, with ten two hundred and forty
eight missing Indigenous person reports filed with the FBI in
twenty twenty four, of which five six hundred and fourteen
were women. Homicide was among the top five leading causes
of death for Ai slash An women aged ten to
(01:04):
twenty four and ninety five percent of cases often lack
media coverage. Today, we welcome to the show Jamie Johnson,
one such individual who was reported as a missing or
murdered Indigenous woman. So welcome to the show.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Hi, so.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Full disclosure. You and I we know each other. We
go back some years, and I appreciate you coming on
the show today because if I'm honest, there are a
lot of issues that affect Native communities. This is probably
one of the most gut wrenching and heartbreaking, and we
(01:48):
have done our best to try to reach out to
get people from different tribes to come up and tell
their stories and share their experiences. Because on this show
we foster allyship. We connect the communities of people who
want to see changes made in the world to people
who can explain what changes need to be made. And
(02:11):
you coming up today is an exceptional act of bravery.
And I know that it's a lift, but people need
to know about what's going on, because if they don't know,
they don't know how to help. And so I applaud
you for taking the time to try to make the
world a better place for your people and for all people.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
I thank you for that. Yeah, we go way back
but I know this is like actually like a little
bit troubling for me because it's not something I really
speak about. I think for me on my standpoint, I
felt like this can happen to me, Like I read
about all time, I see things even previously. I can
(02:56):
say like the week before, we were like like laughingly
joking even on social media, like.
Speaker 3 (03:03):
If I go missing, you better not put my weight down.
Speaker 2 (03:06):
Things like that. And the fact that I remember that
and we were like are like childhood friends. We were
joking about that, and the fact like not knowing seriously
the next week I went missing. Sure, And it's not
something like at the time was kind of like, you know,
(03:28):
you want to think that would happen, And even me
to this day, I wouldn't think I'd be one of
those people on a missing poster or like being out
there known as a missing person, this missing girl, and
even more so like I was on like the murdered
(03:52):
missing Indigenous women, and I think that's like a big
thing for me.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
Sure, Sure, Well, before we get into your story, and
you know we're gonna we're gonna take this very slow.
You know, this is a friendly place. We love you,
and I recognize that a lot of people lean into
stories like this because they want you to take them
into your trauma, because they want to consume it. That
(04:19):
is not this place. This is a connection of how
does this happen? Why does this happen? Who does this
happen too? And that we've found in our travels Q
and myself that the best way to do that is
to have people tell them stories, tell their stories themselves.
I could do my best to tell your story, but
(04:40):
I would not have the same It doesn't come with
the same emotional weight. And so again I want to
commend you know your bravery. I recognize the tears. And
we haven't even gotten to.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
The stream part.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
So we'll put a pin in it. We'll come back
when the time is right. In the short run, what
I want to do is share a little bit of statistics.
I want to paint a picture. This is for our listeners,
and then you know, we'll baby steps. We'll get there,
you know. So these are some key missing and murdered
(05:12):
Indigenous women's statistics and trends as of twenty twenty five. Again,
six and fourteen reports involved Indigenous women in twenty twenty four,
with a significant portion being under age eighteen, data remains
fragmented due to poor record keeping, systemic racial misclassification, and
jurisdictional confusion between tribal, federal, and local law enforcement. In
(05:36):
terms of violence rates, over fifty six percent of Indigenous
women have experienced sexual violence and fifty five and a
half percent have experienced physical violence by an intimate partner.
In terms of geographic focus, of the ten states with
the highest rates of missing persons cases in twenty twenty five,
these include Arkansas, Arizona, Oklahoma, Washington, New Mexico, California, Montana,
(05:59):
North Carolina, southdak Coda in Texas, all places obviously with
statistically significant, relatively speaking populations of Indigenous peoples. In terms
of unsolved cases, the BIA estimates roughly four thy two
hundred unsolved missing and murdered cases, though this is likely
an undercount. And while we're here, you know, I saw
(06:21):
a movie about this just might have been And I
have to find the name of the movie, but I
know it stars the guy that plays I'm not good
at this, but I think he's the guy that shoot.
I can't I can't think of his name, but you
know the woman that plays.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
Yeah, the Yellowstone.
Speaker 1 (06:43):
Maybe that's it. Maybe that's it, but you know it.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
Kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
Yes, that's it, that's it, that's perfect. So I'm gonna
look that up, I know, but because people need to
know about it. But when I saw this again, it's
It's another one of those things that gives some insight
into this. One of the things that we've been trying
to do on the show is help people reframe the
conversations that they end up having in their homes with
(07:06):
their families, with their racist uncles and you know, at
work around the water coolers about the plight of marginalized communities.
I think there is this assumption in this baby of
a country that the way things are is the way
they've always been and the way they always should be,
(07:27):
certainly in conservative circles. And one of the things that
I like to do to remind, you know, people is
to bring the data into the conversations that they end
up having. The truth of the matter is that this
country is approximately two hundred and fifty years old. You
can tack on however much you want to, you know,
to that number, if you want to include the times
(07:48):
when this was the colony of Great Britain, and you know,
whatever all the rest of that nonsense. But the fact
is is that this is a baby of a country.
You know, you compare to a place like China, It's
been around for like five thousand years. This is just
a blip on the radar. And when you look at
the populations of Native peoples that have been on this land,
(08:09):
it goes back somewhere in the neighborhood twenty thousand years.
So this is the land of Native people. And it's
not until we start to see and again that movie
paints the picture quite a bit better, but you see
(08:30):
that sense of entitlement. You see the lack of care
and precision when it comes to native issues, and you
recognize almost like the arrogance of this country insofar as
native populations are concerned, and all marginalized population populations historically speaking.
(08:50):
But there is this stunning silence that I found occurs
when you start talking about issues that relate to native populations.
Q and I we did an episode. This has been
a couple of years since we've done it now, but
I remember going through a lot of the data of
how disproportionately is affected its affecting native populations. Native populations
(09:18):
don't have access to that you know, that sort of thing, right,
And when you look at how you know it's it's
often you know, white, straight, heterosexual, you know, Christian males
that are at kind of the top of every list
(09:39):
that is good, and if they're on the top of
a list that's bad, it's often underreported. For example, you
know one of the things when it talks about sexual predators,
sexual devians, child predators, that sort of thing, that's a
list where you tend to find white men very heavily
represented on lists like that. However, that doesn't really make
for sexy hea and so it's underreported, right Yeah. And
(10:05):
you know, again, you don't really get to a place
like this unless there are systemic issues. And so when
we get into the data, and I do have more
data to share, I want to make sure that you know,
we talk about this in terms and we frame it
in terms of this is not strictly speaking, the responsibility
(10:27):
of native populations, because that's what they like to do
with black people. You know, you guys need to stop
listening to rap music and get off welfare and stop
being lazy and all that sort of stuff, and those
are convenient excuses, and they'll find these fringe examples to
support those excuses, but the data simply shows otherwise, and
this systemic issues are well pronounced in society, and they
(10:48):
turn a blind eye to that. So I want to
make sure that we're in front of that because people
might have a tendency to try to blame these problems
on native populations themselves. And I remember when we went
through this the first time, Q and myself, that's simply
not true. This is a population that is continually exploited,
often enough by those same heterosexual, Christian white men. Again
(11:12):
in that movie, and I'll look that up in just
a second, but that movie really gives some insight into it. Now,
that movie is a movie, and as far as I know,
it is a work of fiction that is based.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
On actual events.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
It was actual, right, But it's a movie. So no
matter even if it is even if it was a documentary,
it's still told through the lens of a crew of
people that are trying to get a story out there.
The story that you have I think really really, at
least for me, it kind of took me right into
(11:49):
what that experience looks like and what it feels like
to go through that. And I think that the human
being and me and all of us really connects with
stories like that. I know that I'm going to carry
that story with me forever, and my hope is that
our listeners will do the same. Before we get there,
I've been teasing it for a long time. I'm going
(12:10):
to circle back to this because one of the things
that I like to do on this show, when and
if I can, is give people some information that they
can use to make changes or be the changes that
they want to see. So I'm going to go through
this once now and then after we're done talking. So
first up, what can you do? So take this website
(12:34):
down indianlaw dot org. Indianlaw dot Org. I'll say it
again at the end, and I'm going to share a
bit from their website. It is outrageous that the vast
majority of these women never see their abusers or rapists
brought to justice. An unworkable race based criminal jurisdictional scheme
created by the United States has limited ability. So I
(12:56):
limited the ability of Indian nations to protect Native of
women from violence to provide them with meaningful remedies. For
more than thirty five years, United States law has stripped
Indian nations of all criminal authority over non Indians. As
a result, until recent changes in the law, Indian nations
were unable to prosecute non Indians, who reportedly commit the
(13:16):
vast majority, or ninety six percent, of sexual violence against
Native women. The Census Bureau reports that non Indians now
comprise seventy six percent of the population on tribal lands
and sixty eight percent of the population in Alaska Native villages.
Many Native women have married non Indians. However, it is
(13:37):
unacceptable that a non Indian who chooses to marry a
Native woman, live on her reservation and commit acts of
domestic violence against her cannot be criminally prosecuted by an
Indian nation, and more often than not, will never be
prosecuted by any government. Again. The website we want you
to visit is indianlaw dot org. There's places where you
(13:58):
can get information, statistics, and obviously you can make a
contribution or you know, make an impact in your community
wherever you are in the country listening to our show. So,
Jamie Johnson, when we first spoke, you told me about,
you know, this party in Farmington, New Mexico, which I
never even knew that you had gone to New Mexico,
(14:19):
so you know, take us through this.
Speaker 2 (14:21):
Yeah, my family predominantly, like they're all from farming to
New Mexico, Like I mean like a little outskirts of
New Mexico, like on private land. I've always grown up there.
I was like I actually I moved away when I
was a kid.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
You moved from there from there here, you trusted everybody there.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
My mom was like young mom too as well.
Speaker 2 (14:46):
I have to give her always, like all my love
and everything because like the same thing with like if
you look at tribal lands, like my dad passed away
when I was two, and this what it kind of
comes down to that because my mom was young and
(15:07):
she was with my dad. I remember how I used
to feel, and I remember not knowing things. So, like
my dad passed away when I was two. He got
shot in our backyard. And it did take three days
before the police came out there because it came down
to jurisdictions. Checkerboard area. Oh that's not our land. Go
(15:31):
check with crawmpoint. This is ship Rock land. Oh, this
is FBI. So before anything was even done, like anybody
went out there, it was three days later. And so
there's a lot of things that I guess jurisdictions where
you are, what land it's on, actually comes down to
(15:53):
who will come for help, because you can actually even
call you call like the Devil Police Department, and more
than likely they won't show up. At the most I
would say, like two hours after the fact, or if
even that two days later, or they may not show
up at all. That's just common, okay, really common. And
(16:18):
I don't know if you look back on things like
there's like missing children and that's how they come up
with like the Turquoise law, and even growing up there.
I mean I moved back there after I had my son,
and I remember that girl like Ashlyn Mike.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
I don't know if you looked her up.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
She I remember driving back to work and I remember
seeing all these police cars. This guy got apprehended because
he's the one who actually killed her, like everybody's looking
out for her. They found her dead, like she was everything.
Nothing was put out there till like way later to
(17:05):
where that's why they started trying to change the laws
of things, so like it's not just like my story,
it's more like everybody else's story as well. This is
what I'm trying to put awareness to So for the
fact that we're even talking about this is like a
big thing because I even have a friend his little
brother's missing too as well, and they found yeah, and
(17:32):
they all they found was his hand, his hand, separate hand.
And I know plenty of people back there in New Mexico, Farmington,
even one of my cousins he's still missing and he's
from here in the valley, you know, from ASA, and
his name was Hector, and they still haven't found him
(17:55):
as well.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
So it's not like just like me. It's the fact.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
That I know so many people and this is like
within the native community, which actually like the fact that
I'm here, I guess I wasn't. I can't say like
this is something that I wanted to do. I mean
not saying, but it's it impacts me. It impacts a
(18:22):
lot of people. And I think the fact that I
know so many people on the spectrum to be in
the situation that I am, and I can say I
know several people too who went missing and they were
fround deceased, they're not no longer here. So for me
(18:47):
being here, I guess it's there's a lot of different possibilities.
So after the fact of that I had to. I
literally moved away, which I understand. Like my mom, she
went through a lot too.
Speaker 1 (19:01):
And so this is before you went missing or after
missing it.
Speaker 3 (19:04):
After I went missing, I was there.
Speaker 2 (19:08):
So if I really want to get down to it,
before I had barely moved back, like I was, I
was in a relationship. I was with my Max. Me
and him were together for twenty four years, and when
I finally left him, I was like, it was the
same thing ongoing. I mean, we had some really great time,
(19:31):
so I'm not going to say anything about the bad,
but I finally left him, and I really looked at
it to be like, you know what, I was with
you twenty four years. That was my dad's lifetime twenty
four years. And I feel like we've already went through
(19:53):
the positive part, Like we've already went through our good
times in our lifetime. And if I was with you
for my dad's whole lifetime, there's another life, Like I mean,
there's more to it. I always wanted us, I guess.
So you can say, like, you know how, like I
(20:13):
guess it comes back to the whole thing. You want
a mom and a dad in your family. Yeah, so
that's what me and him wanted for our son. My
son was twenty, he had already graduated. So when I
actually took the step to leave, I did leave, and it's.
Speaker 3 (20:35):
Kind of like pushed down on me to be like.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
You left and then he went missing, like if you're
with me, you know, if you're back with him or
if you were No, no, I'm saying that's what people
would you missing, So like, oh he kept you know,
so I got a lot of backlash on the back end.
(20:59):
That's why we moved from Yeah, I left, so I
went back to New Mexico. Honestly, like what I was
going through when I actually went back to New Mexico,
it was a week after I lost my grandma, you know,
like they always say, like nobody loves you more than
your mom's mom, you know. So I was going through
(21:19):
all that and it was kind of like I'm not
going to go into detail about me and him, but
like I did leave, and when I went missing was
about it was four months after I had left, Okay.
Speaker 1 (21:36):
So so yeah, so talk us through how that happens,
because I think that for a lot of people you
think of missing like missing children, yes, yeah, and a
child might be easy for a child to go missing
because they might run off and might lose them at
a Disneyland or theme park something like that. For adults,
you know, those of us that live in real populated cities,
(21:59):
if someone's missing, typically it's because they ran away, right,
so they want to be missing. But there's this this
idea I think that people getting snatched off the streets.
It could happen, and people do live in fear of that.
But I think if people kind of are sober in
their minds, they recognize that that that probably only happens
in the movies. You know that you don't know anybody
(22:20):
that's got snatched off the street, and you know what
I mean, So it might be hard for people to
understand how or why this happens. So you know, you're
at a party. One night, I was at a party
that I remember.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
That it was like it wasn't a party I just
went to, like well, like I had this group of
friends who were like yeah, I mean they were like
they weren't friends that I really hung out with, but
I did get to know, like we hang out like daily,
like I mean, because I kind of like I would
The life that I had prior was like they labeled
(22:55):
me as you know, oh that so and so's wife.
That's so and so so. You know. So this was
my first time actually being out because I never used
to be out. I would never do anything. I would
I am more or less. Was just I was a mom,
That's what it was. And for me being at this party,
(23:16):
the last thing I remember is like, oh, yeah, let's
take some shots and not thinking anything of it. I
remember being handed the shot. That's the last thing like
what I recall of everything, and like oh, cheers, you know,
(23:37):
and that's it. And everybody asked me like what do
you remember. I'm like, there's a little bit of bits
and pieces that I kind of but it's like a puzzle,
like I remember. I don't want to say a minute
of things. But in between there, I don't recall a
(24:03):
lot of things like at all.
Speaker 1 (24:04):
Okay, so you were at a party, you took a show.
Speaker 2 (24:07):
And yeah, but after the after everything I did get
like toxicology reports and I did have to go. So
I actually woke up in a cabin in Colorado, so
I can't say like, well, I was in Farmington, this
(24:29):
is where I took the shot.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
Okay, Farmington in Mexico, yes.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
And then I woke up in Colorado.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
Okay, how long between when you took that shot and
you woke up?
Speaker 3 (24:40):
Five days? Five days?
Speaker 1 (24:42):
It was, so you're missing five days where you just
have bits.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
And pieces, bits and pieces, That's what it was. And
I honestly, when I ever, everybody asked me that, like
how what made you wake up? Finally, and I go,
it's gonna sound like ridiculous, but yeah, I heard my
(25:10):
grandma saying wake up. But so like native way, she
called me what she always calls me, and I'm not
gonna say that, but she woke me up and.
Speaker 3 (25:18):
She was like, what are you doing? Get up? Don't
let the sun see you sleeping.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
You need to get up because as Native people, that's
what you say, Like that's just like, get up. You're
supposed to do something, make yourself productive if you're not
supposed to just stay sleeping. Honestly, that's the way. You're
supposed to rise with the sun, go down with the sun.
That's just something.
Speaker 3 (25:40):
And I used to ask her that all the time,
like what does that mean? Why do you always say that?
Speaker 2 (25:44):
Like I mean, because you know, you kind of grow
up like wanting to sleep in and that was the thing.
It was like you wake up when the sun comes up,
and I say, I can say I didn't like it
at the time, because of course you want to sleep
in But that's what I remember her saying, and every
time I went to her, how I loved being at
(26:05):
my grandma's house. I loved being at my grandparents like
all together. And she'd always say that, And I guess
that's like how you think about things, like going back
to your childhood, little things they made you do. It
was like tedious at the time, but like those are
your best memories, you know, that's.
Speaker 1 (26:25):
What got you out of that.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
So so you wake up you're in a cabin in
it well, obviously you don't know you're in another state.
Speaker 2 (26:33):
I didn't. I didn't know I were I was. I
honestly looked outside. I looked around the cabins empty up
there was like I remember being like, there was a
bed because I woke up, of course in red and
there was chair. There was a living room. Like I
walked around nobody was there. Nobody. I looked outside. There
(26:55):
was no rides, no nothing.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
Is this like a city or is this no?
Speaker 2 (27:00):
This is literally remotely in the middle of nowhere, Like
I looked around like thinking, okay, there's no there's no phone.
I didn't have anything. I remember thinking like what do
I do? Like I didn't even know, Like honestly, I
(27:23):
thought it was like mid afternoon, but it was from
after everything. It was like early morning. I thought it
was middle afternoon. I thought I was wild. There was
a road it was not paved. I remember walking down
(27:43):
and I was I felt like I was going in circles.
I was literally walking around in circles, trying to get
down this hill like this, and I don't want to
say hill because it was literally in the mountains, trees, everything,
it was so much, so many trees that you couldn't
(28:05):
really tell what part of the day it was. You can
see a part of the sky, but not all of
the sky. That makes sense. So I remember walking down
and walking and I was just like, you know what,
let me just go straight through. I'm not walking around.
This winding road is taking forever. I didn't know how
(28:26):
far I was going to go. I walked for hours,
and this was like April, so in that time, like
the area I'm in, there's a lot of wind. It's
kind of still chilly, it's still kind of cold.
Speaker 1 (28:44):
It's do you have enough clothes?
Speaker 2 (28:48):
No? Actually, so when I went missing, I wasn't thinking
I'm going to be out anywhere, so I was kind
of like still in my sleeping clothes. So I had
like shrap pants. Of course it's so cold. I had
like like I biked a lot, so like my little
biker my biker shorts, and I had to pull over
on a pullover.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
Well, real quick, how how long do you think you
walked from the cabin to where you found some civilization?
How long was that?
Speaker 2 (29:18):
I would have to say about three four hours maybe
of walking? Yes, okay, all right, no water, no nothing,
so like I tried to see no cars passed me,
nobody were like nobody was it was a remote road.
There was nobody even around.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Okay, well, let's do this. I want to talk about
maybe what the response was, you know, once you did
find some help. In just a second, but let's take
a pause for some commercials, and we're gonna come back
with more with Jamie Johnson and our episode on missing
and murdered Indigenous women. In just a second, keep on
(30:02):
riding with us as we continue to broadcast a balance
and defend the discourse from these hip hop weekly studios.
Welcome back to Civic Cipher. I'm your host, ramses Jah.
You rejoin us with a special guest in the studio
and if you weren't able to hear the first half
of the program. On April fourteen, twenty twenty one, Jamie
Johnson went missing after a house party in Farmington, New Mexico.
(30:24):
She was a thirty nine year old naive American woman,
brown hair, brown eyes, five two. She was reported as
a missing or murdered Indigenous woman and she is here
with us telling her story. So when we last left off,
you had taken a shot at a party or a
(30:46):
gathering will call it, because it wasn't really a party,
and you woke up five or six days later, some
five days later a cabin in a different state. So
now you're in Colorado, Colorado. You don't remember what happened
(31:07):
in between, just bits and pieces.
Speaker 2 (31:09):
Like yeah, little bits of memory, Okay, Like I remember
briefly I would say like.
Speaker 1 (31:18):
I'm sure you needed water, food, something like that.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
I can't even recall of me doing like I mean,
of course, because there's a lot of things I don't know,
you know.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Okay, But yes. So when you finally do come to
you're in one piece. Thank god. You walk around this
cabin in a remote area, there's no one there. You're
in the cabin on your own. You go outside, you
(31:51):
don't see anyone. You don't know where you are. There's
woods and trees all around you. And you see it,
maybe a dirt road or a gravel roads.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
Yeah, it's a road to get up to the place
where I was at.
Speaker 1 (32:04):
So now you're walking down the mountain and you walk
for you said how many hours?
Speaker 2 (32:10):
I would say about I would say about a good
round four hours.
Speaker 1 (32:13):
Fours out of where you were before you were able
to get some help. So what happens then?
Speaker 2 (32:21):
So I went walking. I finally see a paved road.
When I see the paved road, I was like, let
me just walk on here. I don't know what's going
to happen. And honestly, I did not know where I
was at at all. Like I couldn't look around and
be like, oh, this is where I'm at, you know,
(32:42):
I didn't know nothing. So I just walked along the road,
and I could say I walked for quite a while,
and I was just like, you know what, I have
to hitch hike. I don't know where I'm at, and
car passed me. The third car that finally finally passed me,
(33:06):
he passed me, not knowing that it was a hymn
and he even had a trailer. He went past me,
and like I'm telling you, I don't know how far
I walked that there was only three rides that I've seen.
He turned around after me, game me. He turned around
(33:26):
nothing after me, but he turned around so like me,
not even knowing where I was at, I was kind
of scared. Sure, I was like, and he goes, hey,
he goes I can't even recall his name. He was
a sweet older gentleman and an older white guy, and
(33:46):
he goes, hey, my name. I can't even remember his name,
but he's like, are you okay? And I go do
you have a phone? And he goes yeah, and he goes,
I went past you. And it was kind of more
scary for me because I seen the ride go past me.
Of course you're gonna notice a truck with a trailer,
(34:12):
and the fact that the trailer came back around, and
so it kind of scared me a bit. But this
guy was a sweetheart who was a sweetheart to this day,
I can say like, oh my god, thank you so much,
because I remember he had him. He's like, I'm not
into technology. I'm not like this. And he had a
(34:34):
flip phone. And this was back like twenty twenty one.
He had a flip phone. Still, He's all, yeah, I
call who he can. I called my boyfriend. He was
like what, and I go he answered right away, and
I was like hey, and he's like, oh my gosh.
It's funny because he calls me the mosse. He's always
(34:56):
like moose. I was like, I'm over here, I said,
and I had to ask him. I said, where are
we at. He's all said the mile marker, this and that.
I mean, I don't I don't know. I didn't know
where it was. And he goes, it's about an hour
to the state line of Colorado. And my friends like,
(35:19):
I can meet you there. Yeah, we'll be there. So
he had to call. I guess he called the detective.
The detective was like, make sure it's her, because we
can't take her off the radar to make sure it's her.
Because at the time it was five days later. Everybody
said like usually if they're not found within three days,
(35:40):
more than likely they're deceased. And he called my mom,
he called my cousin Carlton, he called like you know,
he called several of the Hey, they said they she called me.
They're like, well, we got to make sure it's her.
So I talked to this man who actually was the
(36:04):
guy who picked me up. I can say, like, you know,
here's my favorite. It's funny because we had this nice
conversation and he was out of small world. He actually
knew who my boyfriend was. Like, oh, he came out
here to fix some windows because however needs to do
doors and windows and stuff. And he goes, yeah, I
(36:27):
know him. So he was like, I probably have him
on my phone. You know, if you look back in
the history, you know, it was kind of that. So
we talked and he goes, this guy was like, you
need some I know, he said he he used to
do equipment. He had equipment that he used to rent out,
so he was We had a nice conversation. Anyways, Besides that,
(36:52):
he took me to the state line.
Speaker 3 (36:54):
He gave me water.
Speaker 2 (36:56):
I remember drinking like three things of water just right away,
and he was like, do you want food? He even
asked me that too, Like small town guy, and he
was like, you want to I'm like, no, let me
just get there. And I get there to the state line,
(37:18):
they were already there waiting I had. There was like
a police escort. There was my boyfriend and there was
my cousin and they were just sitting there waiting for me.
So I said thank you to the older man who
helped me, and he told me that too, he goes,
(37:40):
I passed by you, and I did pass by you,
he goes. I went down the road and something was
like this girl does not belong here, like something's wrong,
something's off, he goes. I drove a few miles out,
he goes. I had to turn right back around, and
(38:03):
I'm so glad I did, and he goes. I did
not think that, but something in my heart told me
to turn back around, he goes. If I had not
turned back around, that was something that would have bothered
me the rest of my life. And I just give
him a big hugs. So thank you so much for
turning back around for me. And oh the fact that
(38:28):
I think it bothered me that, like I didn't know
where I was at. There's like the road was there.
Once I got to the main road, there was a
right way to left way, and I took the left
way because I was just like, I don't know, I
was trying to I was looking at the sun, like
(38:50):
trying to like I could finally be to where I
could kind of see the sun. And I think just
me navigating, trying to figure out. And all I was
ever told was like you just keep walking, you keep going,
you know, you keep pushing forward. And at that time
(39:12):
I wasn't talking to my son. My son wasn't talking
to me because I left his dad, so like there
was so much in my life. There was like I
have to push forward, you know, I have to keep going.
And that's what I did, and I'm grateful for the
(39:33):
people who were there right away. After I got picked up,
I went to they picked me up, and they didn't
make the call to the police department. Yes it's her,
And then the police were like, well, bring her, escort
her in, come to the police station. We want to
make sure it's her. Before they took off my missing
(39:56):
poster and everything. So we went to the police department
and I can't even recall the detectives. He was really
nice and once he's seen me, he hugged me too,
and he goes, you know what, I honestly look through
(40:17):
your social media because if you look at my social media,
you can see like my videos of me just biking,
having fun and just being me. And he goes and it.
Speaker 3 (40:29):
Was just like.
Speaker 2 (40:31):
This girl's all full of life and the fact that
she's missing. He was like, I went home too, and
it kind of it bothered me. It really bothered me.
So the same thing. And it came down to being
like jurisdictions as well, Okay, you cross borders. You were
(40:57):
in New Mexico and then you went you were fun
in Colorado, so I had Colorado people call it like
officers as well, and the same with Farmington. And I
honestly didn't know that many days had passed. I didn't
(41:19):
know what day it was. And the officer told me that.
He was like, you're lucky where you were found. There
was a another younger guy who was found dead the
(41:41):
same where I was walking through the forest. They said
he was found dead in the forest, missing for about
two months or so. So they were like, they asked me,
if will you come to trial once it comes down
to it, you know, But like I was, yeah, okay,
(42:03):
I'll say my story, but it never came down to that.
But the got I.
Speaker 3 (42:12):
Mean, like.
Speaker 2 (42:13):
I don't know if it's just like the vast majority
of things. Meaning he just asked me that if I
was able to come, if it came down to me
actually seeing my set of the story on a trial,
but it never got down to that. So years have
passed and every year that time I kind of get
(42:38):
a lot of anxiety. And this year I actually was
like five years and I can see my life now
from then. It's totally different. You know, I had to
change a lot of things in my life. But like
every year it's like that that day comes about, and
(43:02):
I think this year made it. Oh, it made it different,
just because it's five years. I can reflect upon myself,
like how I am now the people who were in
my life then I'm not saying like nobody's bad, but
like they're not a part of my life.
Speaker 3 (43:22):
And like there are so many people who are.
Speaker 2 (43:25):
Gone since that time.
Speaker 1 (43:27):
You know, gone from your life.
Speaker 2 (43:29):
I mean gone in general, they're they're deceased. I think
this year was actually a reflection on myself to be
like I've come this far and this is something that
I don't even I don't even put out there because
(43:50):
when I was found, I came back and this is
a small community.
Speaker 3 (43:56):
Small.
Speaker 2 (43:57):
I mean it's there's nowhere in the millions or anything
like that, but it's so small that you know, somebody
who knows somebody, like it's all come together, Like you
can pick up the newspaper somebody who was on the
front page somehow, you know somebody there, you know, you like,
(44:18):
it's that's how small it is. Well, when I came back,
it was like a lot of people pointing at me like, hey,
that's a girl. You know, that's amazing girl, you know.
And I think that was the hardest part for me,
was people just point and it was just like it's
(44:43):
just not even that. It was just more like, well
look how she looks like she's you know, probably her
own fault she went missing. You know, there was a
lot of things on that spectrum to be like like
I felt like, I mean that might just be my
(45:04):
opinion on things, but I felt like I was a
ridicule for me being missing when I was grateful for
even being back because that's how small it.
Speaker 1 (45:19):
Was, you know, if I may so, the people that
were present at the party or the gathering, yes, where
you took the shot and then you don't remember anything
after taking the shot. Did the police whatevere, whatever jurisdiction,
did they get a chance to talk to those folks
(45:41):
A and then B. Were those folks like willing to
work with the police to try to figure out who
might have been responsible or who might have been the
last person to see you?
Speaker 3 (45:52):
I think too well.
Speaker 2 (45:53):
I mean I talked to several people, and yeah they were,
but it was very So it came down to the
whole thing of like everybody here should have taken a
drug test as well to see because kind of in
my situation was when I actually took my toxicology group,
(46:19):
it was I had I was drug There was so
many things like in my system. So they asked the
people who were there to take the same thing if
they can't recollect everything that went on, But they had
the no, it's no, I don't know what everything was,
(46:40):
but no they didn't. So it came down to that.
I mean, it wasn't like a big gather. I mean
it was a gathering, but it wasn't Nothing was really
done to that point, and everybody did kind of like, okay,
(47:01):
this is what I remember, this is what was and
but yeah, that's that's as far as But yeah, and
I do have to I had a friend, my boyfriend,
and he had a friend. They were literally and again
(47:22):
with the police up. They were like going door to
door like do you know do you remember her? I know,
you have to, and they were looking for me. And
if I didn't have these people in my life, and
even the police officers told me, if you didn't have
(47:43):
a following on social media or anything like that, you
probably wouldn't be here because I had so many people
spreading my like missing my my friend. I had a
good friend, my friend, and she was the one who
even posted on my Facebook and was like where are you?
Speaker 3 (48:05):
You're always?
Speaker 2 (48:06):
Also, you haven't called me because like every day I
always I have my people who I call regularly, like always,
and I stopped calling in The funny thing about is
everybody's like, wow, how is that even possible?
Speaker 3 (48:25):
Like the day before I had a barbecue and.
Speaker 2 (48:30):
Me being me, I love dogs and there was our
dog fell in the canal and there was tarpa on
the side. I went in to try to save this
dog and my phone had slipped out, so they were
actually like, where's your phone? The last place is crazy
(48:50):
because where we were, my phone ended up being along
the stream, and it was in beyond how Point, I forget,
a small little town, and they were like, oh, yeah,
we found her phone. So it was kind of like
you found her phone.
Speaker 1 (49:07):
But oh so your phone was found, yes, somewhere else.
You're found in Colorado? Yeah, well how about this? The
reason that that I asked that question, and of course
this has been some years since this happened to you,
But the reason I asked that question is because I
would guess, like I'm sure most people would guess, Well,
(49:27):
if you're found at an abandoned cabin five days after
you've gone missing, and the police know that this is
an issue that is quite pronounced in native communities on
tribal lands, that sort of thing, and there was another
boy who had gone missing for two months and his
(49:49):
body was found in approximately the same area, then what
you're seeing is the beginnings of a pattern, you know,
I mean, and getting as much information from the people
at that party would make the most sense in the
(50:10):
world to ensure that a third or fourth or fifth
missing or murdered Indigenous person I guess in this case
doesn't occur, and so that's where that question comes from.
Before we come back to it, I do want to
take a moment, as promised, because again, this entire episode
(50:32):
is intended to bring people into one of these stories
so that they can understand how easily it can happen. Obviously,
you never saw that coming, you know. I know Ramses knows,
you knows me. We known each other since we were children, literally,
so I know that you are that woman on social
media who's full of life, who rides bikes, who loves dogs,
(50:54):
who's a good mom, all those things. This is what
I know to be true, So no one can tell
me any different. And it's not your fault. I mean,
you know this, but it's not your fault. You're just
a person who is living her life and you're at
a I originally thought it was a party. It wasn't
even a party, it was a gathering. And that's what
(51:15):
you do when you know, when you're on lands like
that where there's not a lot of development. Everybody you
just have community, right, and so this is kind of normal.
And you, as your grandmother said, you don't want to
let the sun catch you sleeping, right, So you get
out there and you make the most of your day,
you fellowship with your community. All this makes sense to me.
So I see a normal woman living a normal life,
(51:36):
doing what normal people do, and this can happen to her.
This happened to my friend, right, and then she has
five days that she can't remember. I don't want to
take anyone there. This is why I haven't asked you
what do you remember about those five days? Because I
don't imagine you remember much. That's happy, but you know
(52:02):
you came back alive, and that's really the part of
this story that kind of provides a little bit of hope.
But I'd imagine with more resources, people can you know,
fortify these folks. If people knew this was a problem,
people can fortify these folks who are doing their best
to push back against it. And so again I want
to take a moment to revisit Indianlaw dot org. That's
(52:22):
the organization we mentioned earlier if you want to get
more information or learn how to help, how to be supportive,
how to push back, just how to be an ally
in this space. There's another one that I do want
to share. This is ni WRC dot org. This stands
for National Indigenous Woman's Resource Center. I want to say again, Ini,
(52:47):
do WRC dot org and I'll say it again. If
you want to grab a pen, I'll read from their website.
The alarming reports of abduction and murder of Native women
highlight one of the most devastating issues facing tribal communities.
On some reservations, native women face murder rates more than
ten times in national average. These disappearances and murders are
often directly linked to domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, stalking,
(53:09):
sex trafficking, and long standing harms impacting Indigenous communities. Understanding
these connections is essential to addressing the crisis of missing
and murdered Indigenous women and relatives. In response to this
ongoing crisis, grassroots movements have grown at the local, regional, national,
and international levels to honor the lives of missing and
(53:29):
murdered Indigenous women and relatives and to work toward lasting
safety and support. May Fit fifth has been recognized as
the National Day of Awareness for Missing and Murdered Indigenous
Women and Relatives, honoring and a harris of twenty one
year old woman from Northern Cheyenne Tribe who went missing
and was later found murdered in twenty thirteen. Native families
advocates and tribal nations have risen to shine a light
(53:50):
on the crisis, strength and community action and uplift the
voices of surviving family members. Together, they continue to call
for visibility, support, and positive change to protect Indigenous women, girls,
relatives and relatives. Sorry, and i WRC is committed to
supporting families, communities, and advocates and bringing together awareness to
this national crisis and honoring the lives of all those
(54:10):
taken too soon. Get involved policy changes, legislative action, volunteering, donating,
and i WRC dot org again, that is National Indigenous
Women's Resource Center one more time and i WRC dot
org before we go. I know that you were telling
a long story and we have this couple of minutes left.
(54:32):
Is there anything else that you want to share with
our listeners today in terms of what they should take
from your story or anything like that.
Speaker 3 (54:42):
I think, honestly, I lived my life daily.
Speaker 2 (54:47):
I think I don't want to say, yeah, be a
wary surroundings. These weren't people who, like when I went missing,
I want to have thought I'd even go missing. So
for the fact that it happened to me, I feel
like it could happen to anyone, and it's not just
(55:08):
like in the small communities, could happen anywhere. And I
think this actually made me aware of a lot of
things because you know, you read about it, you see
about it. There's things it's put in, it's put out there,
but you always think like that's not going to happen
to me, And I am.
Speaker 3 (55:30):
It happened to me, and I'm older, Like you.
Speaker 2 (55:36):
Think you'd be like, Okay, you know a lot more,
but I'm I can't say like, don't do this, don't
do that, but honestly, be well aware. Sure, be well aware.
There are a lot of people that went missing. Like
(55:57):
I said, I can tell you like I I have
over my whole hand, I can tell you people that
I know who've went missing. I share stories all the
time on my Facebook, like of people who are missing.
It feels good to know that they're found.
Speaker 3 (56:17):
But there are.
Speaker 2 (56:17):
People who I've showed, I've shared stories with and they're
not found. And it's a big impact to know that
I I was out there, I was a person whose
story was shared like my missing person. And I've honestly
(56:40):
between these past few days, I I told a few coworkers,
like you know, just so you know. And but this
is before they even knew me, and they seen my
missing poster as well. And I actually had to go
to I when after I was found, I went back
(57:01):
to my roots. I've always wanted to see my family
in Oklahoma and everything, and I'm gonna to Oklahoma, Arkansas.
I got so much love and hugs from everybody because
they were like, I shared your story.
Speaker 3 (57:16):
Oh my god. They're like, oh my god, you're well.
Speaker 1 (57:19):
This is exactly why I want to make sure that
you know we applaud you because obviously you're surviving is
the main thing, and you know, the next big lift
of sharing your story so that we can prevent this
from happening in the future. I'm grateful to have had
life take me in this direction to be able to
build a platform where I can share it with someone
that actually know who's been through this type of trauma.
(57:42):
I applaud your bravery again. I appreciate you taking the
time to come onto the show and share that. That's
no small thing. And you know, you crying all the
way through. It is like, oh my gosh, I hope
I'm not hurting something. Oh no special to me, But
you know, we do shed tears on this show. There's
this show is we get the rare laugh but you know,
(58:06):
we deal with the real round here and sometimes that's
easier said than done. So again, I just think that
that is fantastic. So Jamie Johnson, thank you for coming
and uh and sharing your story before we let everyone
go go, we mentioned a movie earlier that kind of
(58:27):
gives a little bit of insight into what winn river. It's.
It's it's a great movie, but also it's a it's
a movie that will grow you up a bit. So
check that movie out. Yeah, and uh, you know, obviously
you can come back anytime, but for now, thank you
(58:48):
for coming up. Jamie.
Speaker 2 (58:49):
Thank you very much, I know all.
Speaker 1 (58:52):
Right, be sure to find us on all social media
at Civic Cipher that C I v I C C
I p h E R. Until next time, y'all. Peace,
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