Judge Denies Plea Deal in Navajo Elder's Beating

0:00It's April 9th. Welcome in. This is Canada News Today, where local news meets AI. I'm Corey with the story. A federal judge in Phoenix turned down a plea deal for 26-year-old Preston Henry Toath who owned up to beating Navajo Elder Ella May Begay and leaving her for dead. The agreement would have given him just three years' time surf for pleading guilty to robbery, but now he faces trial on carjacking and assault charges. According to her disappearance, that all stems from June 2021, when Begay vanished from her home in a small Navajo nation community called Sweetwater. Toath stole her truck with her inside, punched her repeatedly, dumped her roadside, then sold the vehicle for cash and drugs. Begay's son and niece poured their hearts out in court, pleading the judge not to let Toath walk without revealing her whereabouts. Nearly five years later, she's still missing, and her story grabbed national headlines, not letting the crisis of missing and murdered indigenous people.

1:00Prosecutors had backed the plea, arguing a suppressed confession left their case weak, and that a deal offered the family some closure over a risky trial. But the judge said no, prioritizing full accountability. As Toath a way to trial date, Begay's loved ones hold out hope for real answers and justice in this long fight.