THE STORY – The case of Mary Ellen Johnson-Davis, a Native-American woman who disappeared in 2020, exposing how hundreds of indigenous women continue to go missing in the US, perpetuating trans-generational trauma on Indian reservations.
THE CAST – Deborah Parker & Deb Haaland
THE TEAM – Sabrina Van Tassel (Director/Writer)
THE RUNNING TIME – 101 Minutes
“Someone knows something” is a quote that can be attributed to any unsolved case, and here, it is said by the family of Mary Ellen Johnson-Davis. Missing since 2020 from the Tulalip Indian Reservation in Washington, she is one of the hundreds of Native American women who have gone missing and/or have been murdered. This example of ongoing colonial violence is widespread across all Indigenous Nations in North America.
As stated in the film, the rate of Native women being murdered in the U.S. is ten times higher than any other ethnicity. Four out of five Native women experience violence; three out of five are raped; two out of 5 are trafficked. In Sabrina Van Tassel’s “Missing From Fire Trail Road,” women of the Tulalip Reservation explain that to see these crimes, or to be a victim of them, happens so often that it’s almost considered “normal.” For Native Americans, this adds one more layer of trauma to the existing wounds that struggle to heal. Tassel’s documentary, through the telling of Johnson-Davis’s story, opens up a broader conversation about why this occurs, examining the generational trauma suffered by Native American communities and the jurisdictional complications that lead to injustice.
Last seen walking on Fire Trail Road, north of the Reservation, Johnson-Davis’s family retrace her last steps. The audience learns what happened before her disappearance and witnesses her family’s anger about the case’s lack of answers. At the time this documentary was filmed, she had been gone for two years, and still, no one knows the answer to the critical question: Where is she? The film doesn’t frame Johnson-Davis as a victim but as a sister, a daughter, and an aunt. Through her family, we learn about the type of person she was, the closeness between her and her three sisters, and the pain that is shared between them. While the film features talking head interviews, most of the conversations and memories shared come from the subjects speaking to each other, creating a more intimate experience that is much more satisfying to be privy to.
Johnson-Davis’s family, along with the Tulalip Chief of Police, spin various scenarios of what could have happened – and they do have suspicion as to who was involved. But why, two years later, has there been no arrest? The issue of injustice is widespread because of the lack of tribal jurisdiction beyond reservation borders. Reservations are havens for non-Native murderers and rapists who see Native women as easy prey because they can’t be arrested. Well, they can, but this falls to the Federal Government, the Department of Justice, and the FBI. These establishments, simply put, do not care about Native people, which is why these cases often go unsolved and cold.
How Native people are unprotected by law enforcement speaks to the racist colonial policies that view Indigenous humanity as requiring much less legal and civil protections compared to everyone else. When the law fails, there’s protest and community action. The community never stops fighting, and they have many powerful voices on their side, like Indigenous leader and activist Deborah Parker and the U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland. These figures are interviewed, along with Teri Gobin, Chairwoman of the Tulalip Tribes, and make it clear how the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous women is in urgent need of expansive attention and action. Their insight also provides a much broader look at what has led to this epidemic.
The real suspect in this case is colonialism. It always goes back to that. The brutality of colonization and cultural assimilation has never stopped. It has created never-ending cycles of abuse, trauma, and never-ending cycles of stolen people. Indigenous people are often looked down upon and often deemed as addicts or alcoholics. But society doesn’t care to understand why many in Native communities suffer from addiction in the first place. The generational trauma of cultural genocide is the reason why so many Native women succumb to addiction and even trafficking – and there are little to no protections in place to help them.
Many children, like Johnson-Davis and one of her sisters, were stolen from their homes and put in the foster care system to be raised by a white family. Not only were they abused by the man of that family, but they lost their culture in the process. Before them, their parents and grandparents were similarly stripped of their culture by the government, abducting them from their homes and putting them in boarding schools. They lose all sense of themselves, and reconnecting with their culture is often a struggle. It creates deep psychological and physical wounds that are hard to heal and get passed down generation after generation.
Abuse is everywhere. This is explicitly captured in Johnson-Davis’s story, in the shots of the missing persons posters that line fences and bulletin boards, and in the stories of other missing women of the Tulalip Tribes. The loss and pain are often difficult to bear as children grow up without mothers, mothers lose daughters, and grandmothers lose granddaughters. But while Native communities carry a lot of painful history, this history sits on the shoulders of a people who are also so strong and resilient.
The beautifully shot scenes and traditional songs pay tribute to the land and its people, illustrating their strength in carrying on the fight. Inspiring scenes of language and cultural revitalization are examples of ongoing resilience and resistance. “Missing on Fire Trail Road” is an incredibly heavy piece, but it’s the strength and resilience that this community embodies that sticks with you – as well as the message that they can’t fight this fight alone.
