Annual Mother's Day memorial walk in Winnipeg recognizes, honours families of MMIWG: organizer

Dozens marched in Winnipeg on Mother's Day to honour missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls and two-spirit people.

The 19th annual Sisters in Spirit Mother's Day memorial walk was the first to be held since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Attendees met at the site of the former St. Regis Hotel in downtown Winnipeg, which is the last place 16-year-old Sunshine Wood was seen before she went missing in 2004. Together, the group walked to The Forks, carrying roses and photos of lost loved ones.

"The sadness is overwhelming — the heartbreak of the people. You can feel the emotion," Bernice Catcheway told CBC News. "Everybody that walked today is walking for someone, one of their loved ones, and that's so hard."

Bernice last received a call from her daughter, Jennifer Catcheway, on her 18th birthday in 2008. She and her husband, Wilfred Catcheway, walked with a banner at Sunday's march that showed a picture of their daughter.

"Next month, on the 19th, it'll be 15 years [since] she's gone missing, and we're still searching. I want everyone to know — Manitoba, Canada, the world — Jennifer's still missing, and we need your help to bring her home," Bernice said.

The family is offering a reward for anyone who can provide information about Jennifer's location. Someone knows what happened to their daughter and that person needs to come forward, Bernice said.

"I don't see us giving up," Wilfred said. "How can you give up? You can't. Every day we think about her. I think about her every morning."

One organizer of the march, Shannon Hoskie, said a Mother's Day march is important because there are so many Indigenous mothers who are still missing or have been murdered.

"We want to recognize the family that they leave behind, and we want to honour them in a good way," she said. "It's stuff like this that helps the family members with their grief, with the traumas that we experience from losing loved ones due to violence."

Candy Volk attended the march to remember her daughter, Jennifer Dethmers, a 30-year-old mother who died on Sept. 26, 2020.

A pickup truck speeding away from Winnipeg police slammed into a van, killing Jennifer Dethmers and seriously injuring her 10-month-old son, Anthony. The baby was rushed to hospital in critical condition, where he succumbed to his injuries weeks later.

Winnipeg police were cleared of any wrongdoing in January 2021, after a four-month probe by the Independent Investigation Unit, which is mandated to investigate serious incidents involving police in the province.

"She only had one Mother's Day with her baby," Volk said.

Armand Joseph Jr. Chartrand, 43, was charged with dangerous driving causing death, causing death by criminal negligence and eight more counts relating to dangerous driving.

Volk said it was important to remember and honour her daughter at the march, since she always made Mother's Day special for her.

"Even though our children aren't here with us, we're still mothers.… Days like this, especially the holidays, they're the hardest for us."

Marchers laid flowers on a granite monument that honours missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls and two-spirit people at The Forks.

Hoskie said the event was a way for people to create awareness and educate others about the loved ones who were taken from them.

"It's hard work. We call it heart work because we love our community and we want this epidemic of violence … to end," Hoskie said.

"I'm very hopeful that it will end in my lifetime."