WARNING: This story contains details about the murders of the women of the first nations.
RCMP has confirmed that one of the two sets of human remains found in a landfill outside Winnipeg at the end of last month are those of Morgan Beatrice Harris.
Experts have been looking for the remains of Harris and Marcedes Myran since the end of last year. The two women, both from Long Plain First Nation, 95 kilometers west of Winnipeg, were among the four women of the first nations killed by serial killer Jeremy Skibicki in 2022.
In a Facebook post, Cambria Harris, Morgan’s daughter, said Friday’s news were a “very bittersweet moment.”
“Please keep our families in their hearts tonight and every day in the future while we trust this process,” said the publication. “I think both families will bring both loved ones home.”
The remains of Harris were found on February 26 at the Prairie Green landfill north of Winnipeg, one of the two sets recovered in the search, the province said in the press release on Friday night, and added that, as the facts are confirmed, the relevant authorities will provide more information.
Skibicki was sentenced in July 2024 for four first -degree murder positions in the murders of four women in Winnipeg in 2022.
In addition to Harris and Myran, he was declared guilty for the death of Rebecca Contois, 24, and a woman not yet identified to the one who was named after Mashkode Bizhiki’ikwe, or a woman from Buffalo, by community leaders.
The researchers believe that Contois was the last Skibicki woman murdered, on May 14 or 15, 2022. They believe he killed Mashkode Bizhiki’ikwe in mid -March of that year.
It is believed that Harris, 39, and Myran, 26 were killed in early May 2022.
Partial remains were discovered that belonged to Contois in the garbage containers near Skibicki’s apartment and Brady Road’s landfill, administered by the city of Winnipeg.
During the Skibicki trial, the court heard that when the remains of Contois were found, the remains of Harris and Myran were in a garbage container just a few blocks away and a point of being taken to a landfill that same morning.
It was not until June 20, 2022, that the police realized that the remains of Harris and Myran had been taken to Prairie Green, and by then more than 10,000 garbage charges had been abandoned there.
‘Vindication for all of us’
Winnipeg police Initially he decided that it was not feasible to search the landfill. The decision was backed by the then Prime Minister Heather Stefanson and his progressive conservative party, which led to a generalized anger among the families of the victims, the leaders of the first nations and the members of the community.
During the last provincial elections, the PCs campaigned in their opposition to a search for landfills. In advertisements, the party said that “for health and safety reasons, the response in the landfill excavation only has to be.”
Earlier this week, the interim leader of the party apologized to the families of the four women of the first nations for refusing to do the search.
Kinew’s NDP of Prime Minister, who won the October 2023 elections, promised during the campaign to launch a search.
In October 2024, the excavators began to remove material from an area of the landfill where it was believed that the remains of Harris and Myran were, with the search officially from December.
“As we said from the beginning, we [led] And he fought with our hearts and now his spirit can rest, “said Melissa Robinson, Harris cousin, in a Facebook post on Friday night.
Sandra Delande, which was one of a series of indigenous leaders and defenders who wrote a letter to the federal government In December 2022, urging the funds for a search in the landfill, he said that finding the remains of Harris would not have been possible without the dedication of families who fought to ensure that their loved ones “were respected as human beings” and as indigenous women who “deserve to go home.”
“It’s as if your whole body vibrated because they were right … in their hearts they were right.” Delaronde told CBC News on Friday night. “This is the claim for all of us.”
Delaronde is happy for Harris’s family, but said they shouldn’t have suffered what happened to take their loved ones home.
She said that the Winnipeg police service and the city of Winnipeg should have done better to determine a type and level of search of the remains.
“They have many explanations to do as good as the last [provincial] Government, “he said.” They caused undue damage to the family and the community … saying that the lives of indigenous women are not valued. “
Great Chief of the Organization of the South Chiefs Jerry Daniels Said in Harris’s statement, Harris’s story underlines the importance to take urgent measures throughout the level of government to address “the national emergency of indigenous women, girls, two spirit and disappeared gender people.”
“Morgan deserved much more,” said Daniels’ statement.
In a statement, the Manitoba Chief Assembly said the search has always been to honor the life of the four murdered women and other families who still expect their loved ones to be brought home.
“No family should have to search this way, however, their loved ones remained firm in their truth and refused to be silenced,” the statement said.
“His voices brought this search. His love brought us here.”
The support is available for any person affected by these reports and the question of the disappeared and killed indigenous people. Immediate emotional assistance and crisis support are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week through a national line at 1-844-413-6649.
You can also access, through the Government of Canada, health support services, such as mental health advice, community support and cultural services, and some travel costs to see the elderly and traditional healers. Family members seek information about a disappeared or murdered being can access family information link units.
