Emily Pike

Case background and investigation

Emily Pike was a 14-year-old member of the San Carlos Apache Tribe who grew up on the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation in eastern Arizona. Described by relatives as a girl who loved art and hoped to attend college, she had been placed in a Mesa group home for girls in September 2023. According to her family, the placement followed her report of a sexual assault on the reservation, a case in which no arrest was ever made. Records and news reports show she had run away from the group home several times before, and family members said she was unhappy there.

On the evening of January 27, 2025, at about 7:45 p.m., Emily left the group home on foot near Mesa Drive and McKellips Road, wearing a pink and gray shirt. Mesa police handled her disappearance as a runaway juvenile case, and no Amber Alert was issued because the circumstances did not meet the criteria for one. Her mother, Steff Dosela, has said she was not notified of her daughter's disappearance until roughly a week after Emily went missing.

On February 14, 2025, human remains were discovered in contractor-style trash bags off US Highway 60 outside Globe, in Gila County, roughly 100 miles from Mesa and not far from the San Carlos Apache Reservation. On February 27, 2025, the Gila County Sheriff's Office announced the remains had been identified as Emily Pike. Her body had been dismembered, and her arms and hands were never recovered. An autopsy attributed her death to homicidal violence with blunt head trauma. The Gila County Sheriff's Office is leading the homicide investigation with assistance from the FBI, the San Carlos Apache Tribe, and Mesa police. The FBI and the San Carlos Apache Tribe have each offered a $75,000 reward for information leading to an arrest. According to Emily's mother, investigators had questioned potential suspects, but no suspects have been publicly identified and no arrests have been made.

Emily's death drew national attention to the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous people and prompted policy changes in Arizona. On May 13, 2025, Governor Katie Hobbs signed House Bill 2281, known as 'Emily's Law,' creating the Turquoise Alert system, a statewide notification system managed by the Arizona Department of Public Safety for missing people, including tribal members, who disappear under suspicious or dangerous circumstances. The case also prompted scrutiny of Arizona's group home licensing and notification policies, and state officials reviewed the Mesa facility where Emily had lived.

As of February 2026, one year after her remains were found, the case remained unsolved. The Gila County Sheriff's Office said the investigation was still active but that it could not release details because of the sensitive nature of its leads and evidence. Community members maintain a memorial at Mesa Drive and McKellips Road, and Emily's family has continued to call for justice and for accountability in how her disappearance was handled.