‘No means no!’

Posted by Krista Allen | Feb 22, 2018 | News |

Valentine’s Day spent remembering missing, murdered women

Navajo Times | Krista Allen
More than two dozen people gathered at Flagstaff’s Heritage Square last Wednesday for a candlelight vigil to honor Native women who were murdered, missing or stolen.

FLAGSTAFF

As the snow fell, more than two dozen people gathered at Heritage Square for a candlelight vigil to honor the memory of Nicole Doree Joe and other females who are missing, been murdered, or stolen.

There were tearful remembrances by Joe’s family last Wednesday evening, and stories of abused Native women. The crowd a number of times erupted into a spontaneous and enraged chant, “No means no!” Nicole Joe, 40, died on Christmas Day after her estranged boyfriend, Vaughn Clifford Seumptewa, 36, allegedly beat her and left her outside an apartment in the 2200 block of East Cedar Avenue, according to Flagstaff police.

Seumptewa was booked into Coconino County Detention Facility on suspicion of second-degree murder on $150,000 bail, according to court documents. Seumptewa admitted to police that he was involved in a verbal and physical altercation with Joe the night before Christmas. Joe reportedly left the apartment and later returned asking Seumptewa to let her in because of the cold. Seumptewa at that moment started another confrontation with Joe that escalated into violence, according to police.

Seumptewa told police that he grabbed Joe, threw her to the ground, jumped on her and struck her multiple times in the head with his fists, and then went back inside his apartment and locked the door while Joe was unconscious outside, bloodied and battered. The police report describes how Seumptewa and his friend Alec Hicks around 3 a.m. on Christmas dragged Joe into an apartment that was being rented by Peter Fuller. Joe was left on the floor of that apartment until she was pronounced dead at 7:27 p.m.