Hollow Water First Nation hangs red dresses to honour Jana Williams
Williams's remains found last week near Red River at Alfred Avenue in Winnipeg
Hollow Water First Nation is coming together to support the family of Jana Williams, 28, whose body was found last week on Alfred Avenue near the Red River in Winnipeg, by hanging red dresses in her honour and organizing a candlelight vigil.
Though Williams was raised in Winnipeg, her family is from Hollow Water.
Williams, a mother of two girls, was pregnant when she was killed, her family said.
Lena Bushie, a community leader in Hollow Water, said the First Nation is coming together to support them.
"We can't keep allowing families to suffer such great losses like this," she said.
"Especially Jana. Like, she was pregnant with a baby. That is so dreadful. There needs to be justice done."
Red dresses have been used to honour missing and murdered Indigenous women and call attention to the problem for years. This movement was started by artist Jaime Black, who created The REDress Project in Winnipeg in 2010.
Bushie says community members are hanging red dresses, ribbons or clothes — whatever they have — outside their homes to show Williams's family that they're not alone. She hopes it also calls attention to the fact that Indigenous women are still being murdered or going missing far too regularly.
They're also going to hang red ribbons and clothes on bridges that are on the way to the community.
A candlelight vigil will be held in Hollow Water First Nation this weekend, Bushie says. Community members are being asked to make red skirts for the family and help make a quilt: "We wanted so much to help the family, so that they're not alone. The whole community is with you."
Bushie says she will hang one of her granddaughter's red holiday dresses.
She keeps thinking about how Williams was a mother and how her daughters will have to grow up without her.
"So those girls were in my mind all day today, and then I really feel for them, so wholeheartedly," she said.
She also worries about one of her own granddaughters, who lives in Winnipeg and is close to 18.
"I go to bed praying each night, thinking about my granddaughter and all these women that are out there in the city," she said.
Winnipeg police are investigating Williams's death as a homicide.
On Monday, they asked anyone in the community, particularly those living or working in homeless shelters, who might have seen or talked to her in the two weeks before her body was found to come forward.
Police are trying to piece together where she was and whom she was with in the days leading up to her death, Const. Jay Murray said at a news conference.
Anyone with information is asked to call the homicide unit at 204-986-6508 or submit a tip anonymously via Crime Stoppers at 204-786-TIPS (8477).
More action needed on MMIWG
Jerry Daniels, grand chief of Southern Chiefs' Organization Inc. (SCO), described what happened to Williams as "absolutely appalling" in an interview with CBC News.
"It's absolutely terrible. It reflects the sickness that is very prevalent within society, and we have to do everything we can to change that sort of outcome for any one of our fellow citizens," said Daniels, whose organization represents 34 Anishinaabe and Dakota communities in southern Manitoba, including Hollow Water First Nation.
Each time another Indigenous woman or girl is killed, it's painful for other families who have lost loved ones in the same way, said Hilda Anderson-Pyrz, the manager of Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak's MMIWG liaison unit.
"Each time that we lose one of our sisters, aunties, cousins, moms, grandmothers to a homicide, to gender-based violence, its a trigger to know that you've felt that pain as well and to know that you're walking with that family," said Anderson-Pyrz, whose sister's body was found in the snow in Leaf Rapids, Man., in 2011.
"You're holding them up in your prayers and you're helping carry them forward. It's really a way that we honour in the community when we lose one of our sisters."
She said Williams' death only highlights that not enough has changed since the final report of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls was released in June 2019.
"Processes are never fast enough. As an advocate, when you see the devastating impacts on the ground of gender-based violence we need action that is nimble and responsive," she said.
In particular, she said there needs to be barrier-free housing solutions for people to keep them safe, where they don't need to meet certain criteria such as abstaining from drugs and alcohol.
"I think that barrier itself is killing our women and girls."
Calls for national action plan
Daniels is shocked and saddened by the fact that the issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls is still prevalent in Manitoba. But he is also calling out the federal government for not yet having an action plan in place to help the situation.
"It's one thing to have an inquiry. It's another thing to take action," he said, adding that a plan must become a priority.
The federal government is in the midst of putting a plan together to combat against the issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls, Minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations Carolyn Bennett said in a statement to CBC News.
"The goal of the national action plan is to ensure the safety, security and wellbeing of First Nations, Inuit and Métis women, girls and 2SLGBTQQIA+ people in their home communities and in our urban centres," said Bennett.
"We are committed to addressing the systemic racism and inequality which is at the root of the tragedy of missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls and 2SLGBTQQIA+ people."
About $5.6 million through Manitoba's Victims Assistance Fund will soon be awarded to various Indigenous organizations who will bring programming for Indigenous women and girls, Manitoba Justice Minister Cameron Friesen told reporters during a scrum Tuesday.
In the meantime, the SCO is calling for greater security and investigation by police services for Indigenous people — especially women and girls, Daniels said.
With files from Erin Brohman and Marina von Stackelberg