The day after the bodies were found, a tow truck driver who arrived at the unoccupied home to remove the vehicle found the car keys in the yard.
"If the tow truck driver just walks around and finds the keys—law enforcement has access to metal detectors and all kinds of things," said Olivia Gray, president of NOISE's board. "So, why didn't they find the keys?"
She said that it was not clear whether police had looked for evidence in a nearby pond and added that neighbors across the street from where the killings had happened had not been questioned—even when they called police to say they had heard something that night.
"I mean, how good of a job could they have done at that point?" Gray said.
Without presenting evidence, NOISE said it believed the case had been deprioritized because the victims were indigenous, Black, poor and less educated.
"We know that Emily was a teen parent. We know that she had addiction issues," Gray said. "When law enforcement views you as a criminal, they're not going to prioritize your case."
In 2020, the U.S.
Supreme Court ruled in McGirt v. Oklahoma that a large portion of eastern Oklahoma is an American Indian reservation.
The ruling means that state and local governments cannot prosecute Native Americans who commit crimes on the reservation—responsibility for major crimes such as murder is therefore with federal agencies.
But although the state agency communicated with the federal authorities, it remains in charge of the case, to the disappointment of NOISE and the victims' families and other advocates.
"This case should be reviewed and have FBI agents assigned to it actively right now," Newkirk said. "The county owes a public apology to the family for not collecting evidence properly, because when these FBI agents come in, as they should, because of McGirt, they're not going to have very much evidence to process."
Emily Morgan and Totinika Elix were found dead on tribal land in 2016. A new report accuses law enforcement of failing to give it high prioirty.
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