Ashlynne Mike

The Navajo Nation has long opposed capital punishment, but the mother of a murdered 11-year-old girl is asking the tribe to change its stance.



Pamela Foster has started an online petition demanding the Navajo tribe allow the death penalty. In the petition, which has more than 400 signatures, Foster said she’s writing on behalf of “parents of throughout Indigenous Nations” and is pleading for “stricter laws regarding violence against our future generation.”



Foster’s daughter, Ashlynne Mike, was abducted and killed outside of Shiprock, New Mexico, in May. The Santa Fe New Mexican newspaper reports Navajo Nation President Russell Begaye says he supports the Major Crimes Act. The act allows tribes to accept or reject a death sentence in prosecutions under federal jurisdiction.