She didn’t Wander Off: The Story of Ashlea Aldrich and the System That Failed Her

On January 7, 2020, a 29-year-old mother of two was found lying face down in a frozen cornfield on the Omaha Reservation in Macy, Nebraska. She had no clothes. No shoes. No socks. Her sister was the one who found her — saw her black hair blowing in the wind near the tree line by Blackbird Creek, ran to her, pulled her into her arms, and realized she was already gone.

Her name was Ashlea Aldrich, and the official story of her death doesn’t add up.

Ashlea was a member of the Omaha Tribe of Nebraska. She grew up in Macy, graduated from Omaha Nation Public School, and earned a certification in cosmetology — a degree her family says she never got the chance to use. People who knew her described her as laid-back, always giving, always forgiving. Her mother Tillie said she was the kind of person who always saw the bright side of everything.

More than anything, Ashlea was a mom. She had two young boys who were her world.

But Ashlea’s life was also marked by something her family fought desperately to stop — a pattern of domestic violence at the hands of her longtime boyfriend that spanned years.

The Aldrich family didn’t stay silent. They made dozens of calls to tribal police reporting the abuse. They sent written documentation to the Omaha Tribal Council. In 2017, Tillie found Ashlea standing fully clothed in the shower of her apartment, covered in blood. The couch was soaked. There were splatters on the walls and the mattress. The boyfriend was charged in tribal court with domestic disturbance and two counts of endangering the welfare of a child.

But the charges didn’t stop anything. The abuse continued. And Ashlea herself told people she felt like she had no support from law enforcement when it came to protecting herself.

Then, in early January 2020, Ashlea went missing.

On January 6, Tillie received a text from her daughter Alyssa — someone had seen Ashlea beaten in the passenger seat of her boyfriend’s SUV. The next morning, Ashlea’s father Galen spotted that same SUV parked in the middle of a cornfield south of town. He approached it and saw two sets of tracks in the ground — Ashlea’s going around the front of the truck, and her boyfriend’s heading in another direction.

Later that day, Alyssa drove out to the field. Her car got stuck in the mud, so she continued on foot. After checking the SUV, she turned toward the creek — and found her sister.

Ashlea was lying face down, naked, covered in mud from her back to her calves, less than a quarter mile from the home she shared with her boyfriend. His SUV sat abandoned nearby.

Alyssa took off her own coat, covered her sister, and screamed for help. As family members arrived one by one, police held them back from the scene.

Tillie posted on social media that day: “He beat my daughter and left her in a field!! … dead!”

The FBI took over the investigation, as is standard for major crimes on reservations. But what followed left the Aldrich family with far more questions than answers.

An FBI agent reportedly told the family there were no observable abrasions or mud on Ashlea’s feet — a finding that defies basic logic given the conditions and location of her body. When Galen viewed Ashlea at the funeral home, he observed a black eye, a swollen nose, and welts across her body. None of this appeared in the official findings.

The death certificate ruled her cause of death as “hypothermia complicating acute alcohol toxicity” and called it an accident, noting she was “found deceased after she wandered off.”

Three days after the body was found, the boyfriend was charged in tribal court with criminal homicide, criminal contempt, and duty to give information and render aid. He was held at the tribal detention facility in Macy. By April, he was released. No federal charges have ever been filed.

When the Sioux City Journal asked the U.S. Attorney’s Office about the case nine months later, Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Norris said his office was “confident” that homicides on Nebraska reservations had been “fully investigated and prosecuted” and that they were “not aware of any homicides that were not investigated or not prosecuted.”

When KMTV requested an interview with the FBI, they were denied. When they called the Omaha Nation Law Enforcement Agency, they were told: “We do not speak to the media.”

In the wake of Ashlea’s death, the Aldrich family transformed their grief into action. Galen became a member of the Omaha Tribal Council, working from inside the system that failed his daughter to make sure it doesn’t fail another family. Tillie has spoken publicly about her experience and says she can’t bear the thought of another tribal member going through the same thing.

Ashlea’s case was referenced in congressional testimony in June 2020, when Native American ally April Satchell told lawmakers: “Right now our lives don’t matter. A non-native man can rape us, murder us, and as long as we don’t know who that person is, the law right now does not protect us.”

The Sioux City Journal published a three-part investigative series called “Stolen Lives” that examined Ashlea’s case as part of the larger epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women across the South Dakota, Nebraska, and Iowa corridor.

And just weeks after the funeral, Ashlea’s 17-year-old niece Daunnette Moniz-Reyome organized her cheerleading squad at Walthill Public School to honor her aunt at a basketball game. The squad painted red handprints over their mouths, formed an “A” at center court during halftime, and presented photos and handmade gifts to Ashlea’s parents. The school had told them not to do it. They did it anyway.

Daunnette said: “My aunt means more to me than a cheer uniform and pom-poms ever will. I’ll save my cheer energy for the day my aunt gets justice for her life being stolen from her.”

Every January since 2020, the Macy community has gathered to remember Ashlea. They refuse to let her become a forgotten case file.

Ashlea’s story is not an isolated incident. According to the National Crime Information Center, over 5,000 reports of missing American Indian and Alaska Native women and girls were filed in 2020 alone. Native women experience violence at rates far higher than any other demographic, and the vast majority of their cases remain unsolved.

A major contributing factor is the jurisdictional gap in Indian Country. Tribal courts have limited sentencing authority, and major crimes must be prosecuted at the federal level by the FBI and U.S. Attorney’s Office. When those agencies choose not to act — as Ashlea’s family says happened here — there is often nowhere else for the case to go. Families are left in a gap where justice is supposed to exist but doesn’t.

Nebraska published a landmark study on missing and murdered Indigenous women in 2020 — the same year Ashlea died. Since then, activists and researchers have reported that the number of missing Native people in the state has nearly doubled.

Ashlea Aldrich’s case remains listed as open. Her family is still waiting for answers.

If you have any information about what happened to Ashlea on or before January 7, 2020, on the Omaha Reservation near Macy, Nebraska, please contact the FBI’s Omaha field office at 402-493-8688.

You can also support the broader fight for justice for missing and murdered Indigenous women by following organizations like the Sovereign Bodies Institute, the National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center, and the Black and Missing Foundation.

Ashlea was twenty-nine. She was a mother. She was loved. And she deserved so much more than a death certificate that said she wandered off.

Vanished Voices is a true crime podcast dedicated to the cases that don’t get the attention they deserve — unsolved cases of people of color, LGBTQ+ victims, MMIW cases, and stories that still need tips to be solved. New episodes drop every Thursday. Subscribe and follow us on all streaming services.

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Resource List 

Abourezk, K. (2020, January 8). Death of woman on Omaha Reservation under investigation. Indianz.com. Death of woman on Omaha Reservation under investigation

Abourezk, K. (2020, January 10). ‘This is one of the most heartbreaking issues’: Young Native woman’s death tied to domestic violence. Indianz.com. ‘This is one of the most heartbreaking issues’: Young Native woman’s death tied to domestic violence

Abourezk, K. (2020, January 14). ‘When they do turn for help, nobody believes them’: Native women hold vigil in honor of Ashlea Aldrich. Indianz.com. ‘When they do turn for help, nobody believes them’: Native women hold vigil in honor of Ashlea Aldrich

Butz, D. (2021, April 24). A special journal report: Family still seeking justice one year after Macy woman’s death. Sioux City Journal. A special journal report: Family still seeking justice one year after Macy woman’s death

Butz, D. (2021, April 23). Special journal report — Stolen lives: The epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women. Sioux City Journal. Special Journal report – Stolen lives: The epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women

Davis, D. (2021, October 1). Two Americas: Murdered & missing Indigenous women; why no one seems to care. KMTV 3 News Now. Two Americas: Murdered & missing Indigenous women; why no one seems to care

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MTV News Staff. (2020, January 31). Native cheerleader Daunnette Reyome pays tribute to Ashlea Aldrich and other MMIW. MTV News. Native cheerleader Daunnette Reyome pays tribute to Ashlea Aldrich and other MMIW

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Siouxland Proud Staff. (2025, January 18). Omaha Tribe of Nebraska seeks justice for many unsolved murders of Indigenous women. Siouxland Proud. Omaha Tribe of Nebraska seeks justice for many unsolved murders of indigenous women