A bill now waiting to be signed by Gov. Katie Hobbs would establish a statewide alert system for missing Indigenous peoples. It was unanimously passed by the Arizona Legislature on Wednesday.
Had the Turquoise Alert already been law, House Republican Majority Whip Teresa Martinez, who sponsored the recently amended bill, believed it could’ve helped find 14-year-old San Carlos Apache Emily Pike.
“Not only was she killed, but she was dismembered,” she said from House floor during the vote, “and it breaks my heart that we in the state of Arizona didn’t even go looking for this little girl.”
“I would turn this world upside down looking for her,” added Martinez, talking about her grandniece from the Gila River Indian Community. “We need to do that for every single one of our children and every single one of our loved ones.”
House Democrat Rep. Brian Garcia of the Pascua Yaqui Tribe is a fellow bill co-sponsor, who thanked Gila River Indian Community Gov. Stephen Roe Lewis by name for helping champion the cause “because this makes our communities that much safer.”
“These alerts can go out and really start saving lives,” Garcia said, “and one day, hopefully what happened to Emily won’t happen to another child.”
Another co-sponsor is House Democrat Rep. Myron Tsosie from the Navajo Nation. He remembered 11-year-old Diné Ashlynne Mike, who also went missing. Her death in 2016 ultimately aided in bringing Amber Alerts to Indian Country.
“Every day on social media, I continue to see that a member of an Indigenous tribe has gone missing. Families are out searching for their loved ones,” said Tsosie. “This is for shiyázhí Emily Pike, this is for shiyázhí Ashlynne Mike and many others who are still missing. This is for you.”
The Navajo word shiyázhí means “my little one.”
Behind California, Washington, Colorado and New Mexico, Arizona would become the fifth in the nation to implement an Indigenous alert system at the state level, if enacted into law.
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