Emergency responders launched a massive search for Ashlynne after her brother was found. Hundreds of residents packed the Navajo Nation’s San Juan Chapter House, a tiny community hall south of Shiprock, while hundreds more stood outside of the building in support of Ashlynne’s family.
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The man reportedly told the children he would take them to go see a movie.
San Juan County Sheriff Ken Christensen confirmed with KOB his detectives had detained 27-year-old Tom Begaye at 11 a.m.at a Farmington gas station, but were unable to arrest him at the time.
“It touched my heart, and I just felt we had to be here”, she said.
An access road to the Shiprock pinnacle is taped off along Navajo Route 13, just a few miles from where Ashlynne Mike’s body was discovered, in south of Shiprock, N.M., on Tuesday, May 3, 2016.
The boy told police the man then took Ashlynne and walked toward a hill armed with “a curved piece of metal”, the complaint states. Ashlynne was fifth-grader at Ojo Amarillo elementary school in Fruitland. The boy said he saw Ashlynne inside the van smiling as she waved goodbye. She described the girl as kind and obedient.
Begaye, a resident of Waterflow, New Mexico, following his arrest told investigators he sexually assaulted the girl and hit her over the head with a tire iron, the court papers stated.
A criminal complaint outlined the crime based on statements Begaye made to investigators after his arrest.
Begaye was charged with murder, kidnapping, kidnapping of a minor and committing a crime on an Indian reservation, NBC News reported. When that failed, Shawn Mike recounted, the man simply offered to take the boy home from school. Begaye regularly joined one of her brothers at sweat lodge ceremonies and church meetings on the Navajo Nation. The brother later was freed.
The boy was found later Monday after running to a local highway, and a frantic search for Ashlynne ensured.
Begaye doesn’t yet have an attorney.
On Wednesday morning, Begaye was led into a courtroom at the Farmington Municipal Court in an orange jumpsuit, leg shackles and handcuffs. He drove a maroon van with a luggage rack but no hubcaps.
On the far side of a desert hilltop in the shadow of the Shiprock Pinnacle, a towering monolith sacred to the Navajo Nation, the stranger ignored the cries of an 11-year-old girl.
Tribal President Russell Begaye is telling families that children need to be aware of “the dangers of strangers”.
“In light of this incident, we are asking our parents to be with their children when their school bus picks up and drops them off to help ensure their safety”.
A 27-year-old man identified as Tom Begaye, of Waterflow, New Mexico, was arrested hours later in connection with the girl’s death and disappearance, Federal Bureau of Investigation spokesman Frank Fisher said.
U.S. Magistrate Judge B. Paul Briones told Begaye he could face life in prison if convicted of the murder charge. Ashlynne’s body was found six miles from the Shiprock Monument less than 24 hours after she was kidnapped.
Ashlynne and her brother Ian Mike, 9, were taken Monday afternoon after getting off the bus in Lower Fruitland as they returned home from school, according to a Facebook post from her family.
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