Organizer hopes Red Dress Day event will put N.B. cases in 'spotlight'

Natasha Ward of Metepenagiag hopes a local commemoration of Red Dress Day will remind people of missing and murdered Indigenous women from right here in New Brunswick, including Erin Brooks. 

Ward has organized an event on Tuesday in Saint John at the Boys and Girls Club to commemorate the annual day of remembering missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls.

Brooks of Sitansisk First Nation, also known as St. Mary's, has been missing for more than three years and her mother Laurie Brooks will attend this year's event. Ward said that she "wanted to get Erin's case back in the spotlight" and "give support back to Laurie." 

Police have said that Brooks was likely the victim of a homicide. 

"You read about it, you see it on TV, and you know, you feel bad for these people, but you don't truly understand until you have to go through it yourself," said Amy Paul, Brooks's sister.

"It is awful."

Brooks, a mother of four, would have celebrated her 40th birthday this year, said her mother.

When asked about the case, Ward said it's heart-wrenching "but I just want her to know that we're here to support her and we'll be there with her."

She said the case "seems like it's at a standstill" so she wants to "put her face out there, put the case out there," and try to get it back in the spotlight.

The value of a life 

"When you see the red dresses hanging in the trees, it's very haunting, it catches your attention," Ward said. "It helps to call back the spirits of our loved ones."  

She also said the red handprint Indigenous women often wear on their faces represents the silencing they encounter. 

Ward was moved to get involved in Red Dress Day when a controversy about missing women erupted in Manitoba, she said. The provincial government and police initially refused to search a Winnipeg-area landfill after learning that a serial killer may have dumped the bodies of missing Indigenous women there. 

"Our lives are not put at the same value as others," Ward said. "When the landfill cases came out, it really affected me as an Indigenous woman to be disregarded like that and the fight that was put out there to not search for these women was insane," she said. "Mothers were begging to have this landfill search."

When the landfill was searched, the remains of three women were found. Buffalo Woman, or Mashkode Bizhiki'ikwe, was an unknown victim until she was identified as Ashlee Shingoose of St. Theresa Point First Nation in March.

Red Dress Day has been observed on May 5 since 2010 as a day to honour and remember missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls and two-spirit people.

Ward said that she wants people to "get familiar with the 231 calls to justice" and have a better understanding of the issues that Indigenous people face, such as inter-generational trauma.

These calls for justice are laid out in the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls report. The document outlining the calls for justice is available on the National Inquiry Into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls website.

When the inquiry issued the calls for justice, it included a demand for a national action plan to deal with violence against Indigenous women, girls and 2SLGBTQ+ people, and a system of annual reporting on the plan's progress.

Ward said she organized Tuesday's event in Saint John to keep the issue on the front burner. 

"The more that we hold these awareness sessions and get the word out there and educate people, the bigger it will become," she said.