In the late 2021’s, Bethel police responding to an incident of an intoxicated male at the home of 1st Avenue Access found an unconscious woman lying on the porch back. The windbreaker, which was black in color, had been tied in her neck. After removing it they saw the ligature marks that are a typical form of bruising that can occur when a person is snared or hanged.
Nikki Taylor didn’t have a pulse and was not breathing, as per their report. So they began CPR until medical personnel arrived. Taylor was revived, and then medevaced to Anchorage however, her brain was found dead on August. 25 2021.
Her parents are devastated.
“That will be my little girl. I looked after her.” declared Timothy Evon.
The State Medical Examiner’s Office ruled the death to be suicide, however Evon along with Taylor’s maternal grandmother, Sophie Pinder, weren’t content with the decision. Pinder stated that she had called the office of the state examiner.
“When I spoke with an examiner for medical reasons, I informed her that suicide is not a possibility,” Pinder said.
However, the reason for Taylor’s death was not changed and Taylor’s case was ended on the 27th of August 2021.
“Grief is not a relic,” Pinder said. “You will die in them.”
Unanswered questions
The situation could have been resolved in that manner, a sad fact in a state that suicide rates are high. rates of suicide is more than twice that of the national average. However, Taylor’s family continued to push the case for someone who would listen to their concerns. They located the man when Bethel was sworn in as the new police chief, Leonard “Pete” Hicks, in the latter part of 2022.
Hicks who was a transplanted from Alabama to Alaska from Alabama He urged members of the community to speak to Hicks about concerns. Taylor’s parents contacted him and requested that he look into the matter.
“After speaking with them, I said I’d look over the report once more,” Hicks said. When he did, Hicks said that what the report revealed was troubling.
“There were plenty of unanswered concerns that should be answered when investigating a death. The most important thing to avoid to happen is that a case raises more questions than there are answers. This was the case in this instance. Many of the statements didn’t seem to make sense,” Hicks said.
Hicks requested that officers reopen Taylor’s case.
“I believe there was more to the incident that happened the day that was more than an ordinary suicide. We must find out the truth about the events that transpired on that day in the interest of the victim and the the family members,” Hicks said. _
When Bethel police opened the case again and the person who investigated the case, Sergeant. Brandon Boyle, eventually found more than 12 “points of disagreement” that were essentially warnings from earlier investigations.
One reason is that it was difficult for Taylor who was 5 feet tall and 5 feet tall, to hang herself in the area that she was found. The report states that there was not anything nearby to utilize as an alternative step. The report also stated that the windbreaker twisted around her neck could be ripped off by the weight of her entire body on the windbreaker.
The majority of investigators’ other inquiries focus on Taylor’s former fiance who was a man named Walter Williams.
In the police report, Williams was found near Taylor’s corpse when Community Service Patrol officers arrived at the house. The officers later informed Bethel officers that Williams had kneeled over Taylor’s body, and then shouted at them before fleeing the scene. He was later spotted at the hands of Bethel police and was handcuffed. According to their report, he admitted to officers that Taylor attempted to hang herself.
The first investigation revealed that police read to the drunk Williams his rights, and later interrogated the man. According to the investigation, Williams said that he and Taylor were arguing and he stepped off to talk to another person. The police report states that when the time came to return to find Taylor hanging.
“Follow-up that ought to have been completed if it wasn’t completed”
The first officer who investigated determined that Williams was drunk enough to raise Taylor off the floor and bind her with her jacket. The officer also wrote the report that Taylor had attempted to kill herself. However, Williams has a long history of being convicted of assault. Hicks stated that the incident ought to have been investigated more thoroughly.
“You had a suspect boyfriend who had a history with domestic violence. Therefore, there were some issues that had to be dealt with. There was follow-up that could have been completed but had not been completed,” Hicks said.
When the case was reopened and the new investigator obtained a search warrant to access Taylor’s medical records. She did not find any evidence of suicidal ideas. A note from the doctor who treated Taylor suggests that she did not commit suicide attempt as well.
“I do not believe the severity of Ms. Taylor’s injuries can be correlated with hanging from windbreakers. I am extremely concerned about the possibility of homicide and non-accidental injuries in particular since she was been beaten within 48 hours before the wounds,” reads the note.
Despite red flags, the investigation was halted in March 2023 after it was discovered that the Bethel Police Department asked the State Medical Examiner’s Office to revisit the case to review. There was a lot of changes in this department over the years and the case was changed three times.
Taylor’s father was employed by the law enforcement field. When he speaks about the investigation his anger is clear.
“The investigating officer, there are several of them, and two of them have resigned. And the last one is right now, I’ve told the investigator that the only occasion I’ll shake your hands is if this occurs in the courtroom. After that, I’ll take your hands,” Evon said.
Now Hicks the police chief who was instrumental in urging this case revisited the case, has quit too and Taylor’s parents are in the same place they were more then two years earlier, when she passed away: unhappy and seeking answers.
Williams is being detained in Goose Creek for violating a protection order a woman has filed against him and is not charged in connection with the inquiry into Taylor’s death.
The District Attorney’s Office would not discuss the ongoing case concerning Taylor’s death.
The State Medical Examiner’s Office would not respond, but Taylor’s parents have said that their daughter’s death was still classified as suicide.
Pinder has said she doesn’t think the death of her daughter is a one-off case. She believes that there are other families who are battling unanswered questions about the passing of a beloved one.
“We deserve justice,” Pinder said. “How do you feel if this were your child, or if it was your sister? What would you feel? What do you think?”
