ID: 125385
Date Added: 2009-01-18
Date Modified: 2009-01-18
Thinking about Russell Turcotte -- murdered almost seven years ago
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Hunter Gray
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document 53 of 55
Photo by Thomas Gray Salter. A half century of community organizational activism... We cannot run away from the Winds of Challenge and Change. We have to take History and ride with it. Always ahead, always toward the Sun. And always aware that Democracy is natural and, given half a chance, it will always flourish. We have big fish to fry and we're going to have to do it in our own home-grown skillet -- over a long-burning fire from the timber of our own forests. Bear's Lair
Thinking about Russell Turcotte
-- murdered almost seven years ago
by Hunter Gray, 18 January 2009
A native of Northern Arizona, I lived extensively in the Grand Forks, ND region for sixteen years [coming to Idaho in 1997], And from here, I picked up on the murders of the four Native men in the Forks region immediately -- and was probably the first person to put these tragedies and the necessary calls-to-action out widely on the Internet. I have kept up with it all, doing that which I can. [All four victims happened to be Turtle Mountain Ojibwe.]
Our very well visited website page on the murders of Native men in the Grand Forks ND setting is certainly one of our most popular. Three of those murders are now solved -- but that of 19 year old Russ Turcotte, murdered in July 2002 at night, remains unsolved.
As I understand it, state -- and probably Federal -- investigators are now looking yet again at the case. We can only wish them success. And we can continue to think "good thoughts" on behalf of Russ and justice -- and do whatever else we reasonably can,
If justice in all of these Native murders cases has been slow in coming, this has certainly been true in the tragic situation involving Russ Turcotte. Things on that front got off to a poor and ineffective start in North Dakota right from the beginning.
Russ, of course, disappeared from Grand Forks on a July 2002 night while hitch-hiking along Highway 2 to his home at Wolf Point, MT -- and this was reported with dispatch by family members. Local law enforcement officers in the Grand Forks setting were laggard in picking up on it. Early on, we received a reliable report that the police -- after some time had passed -- secured a routine surveillance film from the Mini-Mart on the edge of Grand Forks in which Russ was spotted as a customer. Then for some reason, the police apparently told the grocery manager that he could routinely dispose of the film, and the tape went into irreversible oblivion. It's possible it could have shown Russ' assailant [s] or featured other recognizable customers who might have had useful information. On all of that, we will never know.
While, almost immediately after the report of Russ' disappearance, we were generating many action e-mails to responsible public officials in North Dakota, I began to arrange for a newspaper story on the matter via the Bismarck Tribune. The Trib, of which a son of mine, Peter, had earlier been State Editor, has a significant circulation in the central and western part of North Dakota -- and even into eastern Montana. And its circ also covers the few towns west of Grand Forks along Highway 2.
The Trib story was in the process of preparation when some Turcotte family members asked that it not emerge. The reason for this was that Tim Miller of Texas EquuSearch [Mounted Search and Recovery] --a not for profit group -- had decided to come up from Houston and enter the effort to locate Russ. From the beginning it was clear that Miller -- not at all familiar with the North Dakota setting -- intended things to go his way. As several in the area put it, "He's doing it the way it's done down in the Houston area."
Miller insisted on handling all media himself -- with a focus only on the immediate Grand Forks setting. We honored the Turcotte family's request to let Miller be the sole media manager -- and the Bismarck Tribune story died. [If that story we were developing had appeared in the Trib, it could have led to Russ' body being found much, much earlier than it finally was many weeks later -- and long before it had been hit by several waves of Dakota rain and snow.]
At about this same time, some Turcotte family members asked us what we felt would be the most appropriate search area.
I consulted with another son of mine, John. He and I talked extensively. At one point, years before, he had lived in the small, dying town of Niagara -- about 40 miles or so west of Grand Forks and just off Highway 2. In those days, he made the trip into the Forks and back each day, and had a very good feel for the lay of the land. It was our joint feeling, which I conveyed to appropriate Turcotte family members, that the most promising search area would be on and around Highway 2 -- again, the road to Montana. We specifically suggested west of Grand Forks Air Force Base -- itself about 13 miles west of Grand Forks. The stretch between the Base and Grand Forks is well traveled at all times -- but the vast region west of the Base is all a very, very lonely stretch, especially at night, and with only a handful of widely scattered towns.
This advice was not taken.
Instead, Miller concentrated the search forces [essentially as he was concentrating his media] in much shorter stretches within the Forks and in the four directions just beyond the city. All of this is relatively well settled and traveled turf.
And the searchers found nothing.
And the Miller outfit returned to Texas.
For our part, we began asking that all persons such as farmers and ranchers and hunters and hikers keep their eyes peeled -- especially off Highway 2, west from Grand Forks Air Force Base and well beyond.
And then, of course, in early November 2002, Russ' naked body was found by a rancher, a few miles west of Devils Lake, ND, who was searching for lost cattle. The body was partially hidden in a thicket of trees, not far at all from Highway 2. By that time, there had been much rain and snow.
Now, at this writing [January 2009], three of the Native murders in the Forks area have since been solved. Obviously, Russ' has not.
On that web page of ours, I give my own "theory" about the murder. I am inclined to think it's solid -- but then, again, it is simply my own theory, nothing more nor less. I think he was murdered not far to the west of Grand Forks Air Force Base -- where Highway 2 becomes very lonely and very dark at the time of night he was killed. There are a number of side roads in that setting. I suspect his body, clothing, and gear were carried to the point a few miles west of Devils Lake -- where his naked body was hidden in the small grove of trees. Then I think his clothing and gear etc were taken well to the west and dumped into one of those rivers in that region -- close or just beyond the Montana border.
It's good news for sure that Russ' case is now being reviewed carefully. Again, let's wish the state -- and probably Federal investigators -- all success in solving this hideous tragedy.
And I am sure that many of us, even with our necessarily limited resources, will do what we can to help. The names of a few North Dakota public officials -- and their e-addresses -- are given on our webpage.
document 53 of 55
A half century of community organizational activism... We cannot run away from the Winds of Challenge and Change. We have to take History and ride with it. Always ahead, always toward the Sun. And always aware that Democracy is natural and, given half a chance, it will always flourish. We have big fish to fry and we're going to have to do it in our own home-grown skillet -- over a long-burning fire from the timber of our own forests.