URL: http://www.indianz.com/news/2003/002461.asp

Mother: Police mishandled son's murder case
Friday, May 30, 2003

Ed. Note: Russell Turcotte, 17, was a member of the Turtle Mountain Ojibwe Tribe of North Dakota. He was found dead outside Grand Forks, N.D., last November. His mother, Linda L. Flynn, is a Fort Peck tribal member from Montana.

"After much reflection on my past visit to Devils Lake and Grand Forks in search of justice for my son, Russell Turcotte, I feel that I must respond to a remark that Jeff White, chief agent with the North Dakota Bureau of Criminal Investigation, made during his interview with the Herald.

When I first contacted law enforcement, I was looking to them for help - help that I thought was available to all citizens and myself under the Constitution of the United States, "equal protection under the law." Yet now after all we have gone through, a BCI official makes an inflammatory remark that again demonstrates how the case has been handled from the very beginning, with little thought and effort.

This, I must add, is only one disturbing aspect of how the case was and is currently being handled. Time after time, authorities have offered excuses and cover stories as to why they never followed the leads provided them. The time spent composing and rehearsing these stories should have been spent investigating. It could have altered the entire outcome."

Get the Story:
Linda L. Flynn: Turcotte murder case hurt by callous police work (The Grand Forks Herald 5/30)

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