Hollow promises
(Times photo - Leigh T. Jimmie)
Linda Begay looks out the window of her home in Nageezi, N.M.
Domestic abuse victim suffers at hands of husband, tribe
Part 1 of 2
By Marley Shebala
Navajo Times
NAGEEZI, N.M., May 12, 2011
More than two years later, serious lapses in service delivery by tribal agencies mandated to help people like Begay have left her homeless, her children in foster care, and her hopes for rebuilding her life a dim light at the end of a very long, dark tunnel.
Reading through the inch-thick stack of documents that Begay has compiled since she first obtained a protection order against her estranged husband in December 2008, it's as if she's caught in a waking dream: She speaks, but those whose help she needs cannot understand and some, exhausted by the complexity of her situation, have simply given up trying.
Linda and Wallace Begay were a touching love story at one time, two people who'd both been dealt a bad hand by life, but who met while working at the Navajo Agricultural Products Industry and felt like finally, they'd gotten a little lucky.
Linda has a mental impairment and Wallace, friends say, has a severe hearing and speech deficit. He declined to be interviewed for this story.
Linda has no recollection of ever being tested or officially diagnosed with an intellectual deficit, but her family recognized early on that she had trouble learning, so she spent most of her youth herding sheep.
Later she got a job as a farm laborer with NAPI, and had a baby boy. Then she met Wallace, another NAPI worker, and they began dating. They married June 4, 1992, and as each of four more babies were born, the circle of people who cared about them grew one at a time.
But almost from the first, Linda now says, Wallace was prone to foul-tempered outbursts. In two requests for protection orders filed in 2008, she stated that she had endured physical, mental and emotional abuse throughout their 16-year relationship, which included Wallace pouring kerosene over her, slamming her head into the rear end of a car, and kicking her during all of her pregnancies.
She also claimed that Wallace had on occasion thrown their children out the window and told them they are not his.
Among her papers is a cartoon of her drawn by Wallace and left for her to find at the trailer where they last lived together. The drawings are crude pencil sketches of her nude body, worn out by childbearing, with vulgar comments on each figure flaw.
At once childish and vicious, they give a hint - just a hint - of what it must be like to live with someone who has absolutely no respect for you.
In 1995, Linda said, Wallace's violent behavior cost the family their home in a Navajo Housing Authority subdivision in Nageezi. It also cost his sister, Wilma Begay, her home in the same neighborhood.
Linda's description of how Wallace vandalized their NHA house parallels Wilma's description of his actions towards her too, contained in a petition for a protection order against Wallace filed Nov. 3, 1995, in Crownpoint District Court.
Wilma reported that Wallace broke the windows and doors of her house, threw food out of the refrigerator, scattered her clothes around her bedroom, punched holes in the walls, vandalized her car and truck, and threatened her for two months leading up to her request for a protection order.
NHA, which has strict rules against violence towards people and property in its developments, evicted both sets of Begays. Wallace, Linda and their children family then moved into a doublewide trailer located on Linda's family land in Nageezi. It had no electrical service or running water, but they had a generator and hauled water in barrels, so conditions were no worse than many Navajo families endure.
There the family lived until the Oct. 13, 2008, incident occurred that finally convinced Linda she'd had enough.
Flight from violence
Wallace had been up all night drinking and watching TV, the volume on high so he could hear it, Linda said. At about 4 a.m. she asked him to turn it down, and told him she was tired of his drinking and keeping everyone awake all night.
The kids lost so much sleep they would oversleep and miss the school bus, she said. None of the family's vehicles was in working order, so missing the bus meant missing school - again.
Then Linda turned to walk away, and as she did so Wallace allegedly threw a ceramic mug at her, hitting her in the back of the head so hard that it knocked her senseless.
He then began hitting her, Linda stated in her Oct. 21, 2008, petition to the Shiprock District Court for a protection order. She ran out of the trailer and into the cold autumn night dressed only in a nightgown. Wallace threw a knife but it missed her, she stated in her petition.
Her son, then 14, tried to defend his mother, exchanging a few punches with his father. He then grabbed a few things to keep warm, his school backpack, and followed her into the night, Linda stated.
Wallace yelled after them that he would kill her and the children.
Linda didn't wait to hear more, she fled for her life, leaving behind her daughters, aged 15, 8, and 11 months.
She and her son spent the rest of the night in a ditch. At dawn, he caught the school bus and Linda later flagged down a vehicle driven by her cousin-brother, Calvin Hesuse. She told him what happened and he offered to help.
That day, and for the next week, she and the children crowded into Hesuse's small house in Nageezi, afraid to return to the trailer and risk a confrontation with Wallace.
On Oct. 21, 2008, Linda filed the first of two petitions requesting a protection order against Wallace so that she and the children could return home. The court issued a temporary order requiring Wallace Begay to vacate the trailer, stay away from Linda and the kids, and seek help with anger management and alcohol abuse.
Wallace, she said, ignored the order, coming and going from the trailer - which is in her name - and committing acts of vandalism when the mood struck him. On Oct. 23, she again petitioned the court, this time for an emergency order to enforce the first order.
Assisted by Hesuse, Linda also arranged for legal representation by DNA Legal Services Inc. in Shiprock. Legal advocate Esther Keeswood was assigned to help her.
But while Linda was in court seeking the enforcement order, a social worker from the Navajo Nation Division of Social Services was picking up the Begay children at school under an order of temporary custody based on "allegations of physical neglect, domestic violence and drinking by (the) father."
'I want my babies'
"I want my babies back," Linda pleaded in a 12-page letter sent to 22 tribal, state, federal and private organizations on Oct. 31, 2008. "Please help me. I want to divorce my not caring husband so I can be a better single parent for my four children. Please help me."
Begay explains in the letter why she stayed with Wallace for so long, why she finally left him, and why she now needs help.
Her reason for staying is shared by many domestic violence victims, male and female alike. Wallace repeatedly promised that he'd never abuse her and the kids again, she said.
"I kept silent for him - I prayed to God he'll get better this time," Linda states in her letter. "And each year for 16 years, he had destroyed and broke-up my family by having the Navajo Nation take away my children - all because of his not caring ... (T)he Navajo Nation pile a bunch of 'You must do this or else you'll lose your kids forever.' But the Navajo Nation does not hold Wallace accountable."
The Navajo Nation Division of Public Safety confirms receiving seven calls for protective assistance from Linda - she says she made many more than that - but to date Wallace Begay has not been charged with threatening, assault, vandalism or other crime of domestic violence.
Wallace, meanwhile, flouted the court order requiring him to stay away from the trailer, making it impossible for Linda to re-establish a safe home environment there - a key requirement to regain custody of her children.
Barely a month after being assigned Linda's case, Esther Keeswood withdrew as her legal advocate, leaving Linda to represent herself in seeking to extend the protection order against Wallace.
The hearing on whether to extend the protection order against Wallace Begay took place Dec. 5, 2008, with Wallace representing himself, and a sign language interpreter, and Linda representing herself.
Wallace told the court he would soon be relocating to Albuquerque to find work, and noting that, the court gave him until Dec. 19, 2008, to move out of Linda's trailer. Thereafter he was to stay away from it and any other public and private areas where she might be conducting business, on and off the reservation.
Wallace was prohibited from communicating with Linda in person, in writing, by e-mail, fax, text messaging, telephone, or through a third party.
The court also ordered him not to sell, remove, hide, destroy, and/or damage any of Linda's property.
The order was accompanied by a warning: "To respondent, Wallace Begay, this is an official court order. If you violate this order, the court may find you in contempt and sanction you with a fine of $250 or 180 days imprisonment or both. You may also be arrested and prosecuted for the crime of interfering with judicial proceedings and any other crime you may have committee in disobeying this order."
The term of the order was one year; Linda says no one told her at the time that she could have asked for a five-year order.
Waiting to go home
In June 2009 the order was still in effect when Linda returned to her doublewide trailer to show the Navajo Times the beating it has taken, allegedly from Wallace.
According to Linda, Wallace ignored the protection order entirely. He did not move to Albuquerque as he had told the court he would. Instead, he continued living in the trailer, removed furniture from it, and made threats against her and the children.
The trailer has broken windows and doors, holes in the walls, and clothes, bedding and household items strewn around inside and out. Here and there, patches of fresh paint have been applied to the exterior walls to cover obscene words and threats against Linda and Hesuse.
She gazed out the large living room window, her smile fading as she recalled the birthday parties and holiday dinners her family celebrated there.
Then she looked down at the yard below the window, saying that's where her children played. The memories brought tears to her eyes.
Soft pink baby clothes - brand new - still hang in the closet of a bedroom, where an almost-new white crib stands near an east window.
The view from her trailer is a panorama of red earth and rolling hills covered with sagebrush, wildflowers and other native plants. The quiet isolation of the trailer would be soothing for Linda if not for the memories of abuse she suffered there.
If not for the missing voices of her children.
Next week: Why is the system failing Linda Begay? Comments - and silence - from top officials shed some light on the problems faced by a domestic violence victim with a mental disability, and on the urgent need for advocates trained to meet their special needs.
NEXT - Part 2: Part Two - Linda's story: Alone, afraid and sad »