Paiute Journalist Myron Dewey's Family Choked with Grief, as Driver Given Minimal Sentence

Choking with grief, Myron Dewey's family described their loss, as the court handed down a minimal sentence for the driver of the truck who killed Myron

By Brenda Norrell
Censored News
June 6, 2023

PAHRUMP, Nevada -- Choking with grief and shaken from trauma, Myron Dewey's family described the horrific loss and life-threatening depression that now follows the death of the one they loved so deeply. Myron's daughter, sons, and wife described their unbearable grief, and his sister described the agony of watching Myron die, crushed inside his car.

After describing the agonizing loss of the one they loved so deeply, the driver of the truck that killed Myron in a head-on collision, John Walsh, a mining engineer who lives in Reno, received a minimal sentence in Nye County court in Nevada on Tuesday.

Despite the unimaginable sorrow expressed in court this afternoon, Tonopah Judge Jennifer Klapper gave Walsh a minimal sentence.

Myron, 49, Walker River Paiute, killed on Sept. 26, 2021, was known internationally as a water protector, journalist and drone activist at Standing Rock in North Dakota. Myron live-streamed from the Navy bombing range in Fallon, on his Paiute Shoshone homeland in Nevada, the day before he was killed, opposing its expansion. The expansion was pushed by the Nevada Congressional delegation and became law in the military spending bill for 2023.

In his last livestream video, Myron spoke out against the lithium mine on the Paiute Massacre Site at Thacker Pass, where today a prayer camp is resisting destruction by Lithium Americas of Canada in northern Nevada, as it digs into the massacre site and unmarked burial places. Myron spent his last weeks carrying supplies to those resisting the lithium mine, which President Biden has pushed as "green energy."

In the courtroom on Tuesday, Myron's daughter Taylor Dewey, choking back incredible sorrow, was the first of five of Myron's family members to share what the loss meant to her and her children.
Taylor described how she heard the tragic news of her dad's death while she was at Disney with her four young children. She shared the conversations she always wanted to have with her dad, and now, at the age of 26, she would never have.

"My dad was so young, he had so much left to give," Taylor told the court, and she spoke of her broken heart.

Read the full article at Censored News, with the words of family members, the change in charges for the driver, John Walsh, by prosecutors, and the sentence delivered by the judge on Tuesday.

About Censored News

Censored News was created by Brenda Norrell, a news reporter in Indian country for 40 years, as a result of being censored and terminated as a staff reporter at Indian Country Today. She began as a reporter at Navajo Times, and was a correspondent for Lakota Times, Associated Press and USA Today during the 18 years that she lived on the Navajo Nation. Today, Censored News is in its 17th year. It is a collective with 22 million pageviews, with no ads, salaries or revenues.