6 months after she was killed, Acey Morrison's family is still left without answers
More than six months after her daughter Acey Morrison was killed in Rapid City, Edelyn Catches is still left without any answers from local law enforcement on the case.
Catches said she was made recently aware that Pennington County State’s Attorney Mark Vargo is now handling the case, but that’s all she knows. She said she’s struggled to get a response from him on the status of the investigation.
At the time of Morrison’s death, the Human Rights Campaign estimated she was at least the 32nd trans or gender non-conforming person violently killed in 2022 in the U.S. and Puerto Rico.
Vargo told the Argus Leader the case remains under investigation and in the hands of law enforcement.
“We will reveal when they have completed it, but I know that some of my staff have been updated on kind of where it sits in the investigative process, but I have not been read in on that, so I don't know exactly what that answer is,” Vargo told the Argus Leader on Feb. 21. “I know that they've been in communication with us. As of yet, (there’s been) no decision made by law enforcement.”
More:Remembering Acey Morrison, a Two Spirit person, for Transgender Day of Remembrance in 2022
Catches said she also hasn’t heard back from Detective Cameron Ducheneaux, the investigator assigned to Morrison’s case, on a regular basis, even though she tries to reach the investigator each week.
Officials with the Pennington County Sheriff’s Office did not respond to calls and emails from the Argus Leader regarding this case. Brendyn Medina, with the Rapid City Police Department, confirmed the case is at the Pennington County State's Attorney's office.
'All of us know Acey. She would fight for her life'
Morrison, a 30-year-old Two-Spirit person, was shot and killed in Rapid City on Aug. 21, 2022. Media outlets in Rapid City have had few updates on her case. National news outlet BuzzFeed reported Morrison was killed after meeting up with a man from a dating app.
Catches said when family members saw Morrison’s body, she had bruises on her arm and shrapnel up her neck. She said she disputes that Morrison’s attacker was acting in self-defense.
“All of us know Acey. She would fight for her life,” Catches said.
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Last November for Transgender Day of Remembrance, Morrison was honored with a ceremony at Calvary Episcopal Cathedral in Sioux Falls, hosted by the Transformation Project, Sioux Falls Pride, Equality South Dakota, local advocates and Indigenous community members.
At that time, family members were still struggling to get answers from police on the status of the case and who, if anyone, was goin to be charged. Above all, they want justice for Morrison.
“The information we’ve been told by the investigators and police department doesn’t add up,” Morrison’s cousin Casey Morton said in November. “I think it’s a hate crime. It’s an MMIW (missing and murdered Indigenous women) issue, too. It hits so many different things. All these things are a factor of what could’ve happened that night. It’s sad to say, but we don’t really know what happened."
More:How South Dakota is trying to address the missing and murdered Indigenous women crisis
Across the U.S., “the total number of missing or murdered is unknown because no federal data base that includes tribal, state and law enforcement data exists,” according to a 2021 Government Accountability Office report. In South Dakota, there are 62 missing Indigenous people, 35 of them women, out of 103 missing people, according to the attorney general’s missing person’s database as of Wednesday.
“How can someone take someone’s life and not have to answer for it?” Morton asked at the time.
This article originally appeared on Sioux Falls Argus Leader: Acey Morrison's family still doesn't know who killed her in Rapid City
