The Case of the Missing Blackfeet Women

Investigative reporter Renevier sheds harsh light on the disappearances and deaths of dozens of Blackfeet tribe members in Montana between 2017 and 2023 in the infuriating latest installment of Crime Ink’s 50 States of Crime series (after Hélène Coutard’s The Chandra Levy Case). “In the land of the free,” Renevier writes, “Native American women were statistically more likely to be raped or murdered than to attend university.” She grounds the account with individual profiles, including of 20-year-old Ashley Loring HeavyRunner, whose family never saw her again after she left home in 2017 to attend a party near Browning, Mont. Despite evidence of foul play and three promising suspects, Ashley’s fate remains unknown, though her sister mounted a robust search effort. Renevier matches visceral descriptions of grieving family and friends with righteous anger at the flagrant, sometimes suspicious lack of response from tribal, local, and federal law enforcement. Evocative prose enhances her probe (“On the Blackfeet Reservation, crimes are like snowstorms. They catch you off guard and hit more often than you’d expect, in winter and summer alike”). It’s a stirring examination of an overlooked tragedy.(Mar.)