ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) – A new documentary profiles two Alaska Native families as they seek justice for their murdered loved ones, diving into the generational trauma of families and communities grappling with violence, barriers within the criminal justice system and years of grief and unanswered questions, according to Corinne Smith with the Alaska Beacon.
The new film, “In the Wake of Justice Delayed,” follows five years in the families’ search for justice – in two cases of murder of Native women, one more recent murder in Palmer in 2019 and one decades ago in Point Hope in 1985 – and a diving into the interconnected grief and impacts of violence in the ongoing crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous people, particularly women, in Alaska.
The film is set to premiere in Alaska with screenings in Anchorage on Sept. 21, and Homer on Sept. 27. It will air nationwide on PBS on Nov. 1.
The documentary opens with the statement: “Native women and girls experience a murder rate 10 times higher than the national average,” by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
“Women are not just statistics. They are not just numbers,” said Alice Quannik Glenn, a journalist and podcast host from Utgiagvik featured in the film. “They’re real people that influence the other people around them. They influence their communities. So when one of us isn’t safe, it makes us all vulnerable.”
For the Miller family of Teller, pop 249, located about 70 miles outside of Nome, the once tight-knit family was devastated by the murder of their daughter, twin-sister, and mother Mingnuna Bobbi Jean Miller in Palmer in 2019.
The film follows her twin sister Billi Jean Miller navigating the loss of her twin, as well as their mother Diane Miller, going through the pain of the subsequent five-year trial of her then-boyfriend charged with murder.
“If I could push one thing, it’d be to know how to advocate for your family,” Miller says in the film. “When she died, I didn’t know how to advocate for her. I would have talked more to the police department or investigator.”
In a phone interview, Miller said sharing Bobbi’s story brings a mix of emotions, but she hopes it will inspire change in how domestic violence incidents – and Native women – are seen and addressed by law enforcement.
“That shouldn’t have been her story,” she said.
Miller said her twin sought help from the Palmer Police Department days before her death. “She wanted to come home and you know, they stigmatized her as just a Native woman on drugs, but she wasn’t on drugs. And that’s just the sad reality is that we’re treated differently,” she said. “They should have done their due diligence of helping her, if that’s their profession.”
For the Lane family of Point Hope, population 830, the grown children of Harriet Lane share their grief and outstanding questions of what happened to their mother.
“I would like to see my mother rest in peace,” her son, Amos Lane said in the film. “Thirty years later, there are still unanswered questions that need to be addressed.”
In 1985, Harriet Lane was tortured, raped and murdered by three men in their community of Point Hope.
“I don’t know what really happened. But that’s what people say happened,” Amos Lane said, and that it was never properly investigated. “So, that’s brutal.”
The family is continuing to grapple with the pain of her death, and calling for the case to be re-opened and investigated. “To this day, no one’s been charged with a murder,” he said. “Something is wrong.”
“No one should have to deal with this … without any resolution, without any closure, without any justice.”
The film is the six year project of filmmaker and director Mary Katzke and Affinityfilms, Inc. a non-profit educational media production company based in Anchorage.
“The story is about what it does to the psychological condition of people who are not acknowledged or believed or see any justice whatsoever,” Katzke said in a phone interview.
The film overlays the personal tragedies in the wider historical background of Alaska’s history of colonization, exploitation of natural resources and violence against Alaska Native communities, including slavery. During Russian colonization of Alaska beginning in the 18th century, the fur traders enslaved Ungangan peoples of the Aleutian Islands to force them to hunt for seals for the lucrative fur trade. The legacy of that violent period has been felt for generations, Tara Bourdukosky of St. Paul Island explains in the film, and continues to be felt today.
“It is important to want to know, to talk about these things, to find out what actually happened in our past and how we got to be where we are today,” she said.
Katzke said it was important to depict the generational trauma and legacies of violence felt by Alaska Native communities today.
“I’ve been here 40 years, but I’ve never connected how that introduction to our (Western) culture, to our world, was so negative and traumatizing for so many people. And it’s important to understand that that’s the root base of families for generations. So there’s a distrust, and rightfully so, that they’re going to be treated right by this law enforcement. They have their own ways of dealing with murder in in their villages, and that was crushed when they brought in official law enforcement people,” she said. “So understanding that is a foundation to people and culture that has been violated so many times for so long is a big part of understanding the crime rate.”
Miller said she also hopes the film raises awareness about how domestic violence is addressed. “Victims of domestic violence are real people, and the system fails a lot of DV survivors and people that are lost to DV,” she said. “I just hope that there’s a really big impact, and that it brings on a really great change … because it is a crisis.”
Miller said going through the almost six year court process changed her, and sharing her experience in the film was emotional and difficult, but ultimately the family welcomed the verdict and feel they received justice.
“Because a part of me wants to push those feelings under the rug, and then a part of me is just really, really, extremely grateful that Bobbi is important… that she was a real human and that she was so loved,” she said. “I think we’re very fortunate that Bobbi’s story was told, and I think Bobbi’s very fortunate to have received justice for her story. And the process was hard because it was five, almost six years long.”
She said she wants the film to shed light on the Alaska Native families and communities now enduring the search for justice for murdered loved ones.
Currently the number of victims and unsolved cases of missing and murdered Indigenous people in Alaska is unknown. The non-profit Data for Indigenous Justice is putting together its own database of cases, and filed a public records request with the Alaska Department of Public Safety for the list of names of victims and cases investigated, and the state denied their request.
“I just hope that the audience takes away that these are people that are very much loved, and they deserve better,” Miller said.
Katzke said she also hopes to see changes in the court system, and speedier trials.
“The target audience for this film is future jury members, lawyers, judges, and law enforcement…and then how important it is to support people that are brave enough to come forward,” she said. “And so I hope that Alaskans understand more of their own history, that they understand more on missing and murdered Alaska Native women.”
This story was republished with permission from the Alaska Beacon.
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