CBS News has put together a project to investigate the missing and murdered Indigenous women. The project highlights the profiles of 306 missing or murdered Indigenous women in Canada. While the project contains the profile of 306 women it is thought that the number of missing and murdered women is much higher with estimates ranging as high as 4,000. women (The Guardian). Some of these women have had their deaths written off as suicides or death due to the weather. In many of these cases the police did not look more closely to see if there was foul play involved.
It appears as though often times the police are unwilling to spend a lot of time looking into these cases because they assume that the lifestyles of these women lead to their disappearance or death. Some of these assumptions made by police are based on racist ideas that they have of the Indigenous people of Canada. These racist ideas are perpetrated by the various dominant narratives that exist in both the United States and Canada. There is no basis for these narratives but there existence shapes the police response to these crimes (CBC News).
