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Press Release

Three Defendants Plead Guilty to Murder and Assault on the Red Lake Indian Reservation

For Immediate Release
U.S. Attorney's Office, District of Minnesota

ST. PAUL, Minn. – Three individuals have pleaded guilty for their roles in a murder that took place in August 2019 on the Red Lake Indian Reservation, announced United States Attorney Andrew M. Luger. 

According to court documents, on August 12, 2019, Alexia Gah Gi Gay Mary Cutbank, 21, of Bemidji, Mia Faye Sumner, 21, of Duluth, and Daniel Charles Barrett, 31, of Redby, armed with at least one handgun, entered the garage of a residence where Daniel Alan Johnson was known to reside. Once inside, Cutbank fired multiple gunshots, fatally wounding Johnson and seriously injuring a second victim, T.B.S. The three defendants returned to the waiting vehicle and left the scene. To assist the defendants in avoiding arrest, Rose Celeste Siewert, 50, of Cass Lake, drove Cutbank, Barrett, and Sumner off the Red Lake Indian Reservation.

Cutbank pleaded guilty yesterday before Senior U.S. District Judge Susan Richard Nelson to one count of aiding and abetting murder in the second degree and one count of aiding and abetting assault resulting in serious bodily injury. Barrett pleaded guilty on August 16, 2022, to one count of aiding and abetting murder in the second degree. Siewert pleaded guilty on September 14, 2022, to one count of accessory after the fact. Sentencing hearings for Cutbank, Barrett, and Siewert have not yet been scheduled. Sumner is currently scheduled to go to trial on October 31, 2022.

This case is the result of an investigation conducted by the Red Lake Tribal Police Department, the FBI, the FBI Headwaters Safe Trails Task Force, the Duluth Police Department, the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, and the Minnesota Department of Corrections, in collaboration with the United States Attorney’s Office Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Initiative.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Deidre Y. Aanstad is prosecuting the case.

Updated September 22, 2022

Topics
Violent Crime
Indian Country Law and Justice