Charlene Kerr, Johnson s niece, was stabbed to death in the Lamplighter Hotel in the 1980s. There should be some change. It s disheartening that there isn t, she said, adding that there needs to be more awareness of the violence Indigenous women and men face.
Johnson said little has been done to properly investigate the disproportionate amount of Indigenous women that go missing or are killed in Vancouver s Downtown Eastside neighbourhood. Because we re First Nation, we re meaningless to society. That gets to be tiresome, she said.
Serial killer Robert Pickton was convicted in 2007 on six counts of second-degree murder but is suspected of killing dozens of women who went missing from the Downtown Eastside.