Man who torched car with dead wife inside in the NC mountains sentenced to prison
A man who lit a car ablaze with his dead wife inside in the N.C. mountains was sentenced to life in prison Thursday, federal prosecutors in Charlotte said.
Marie Walkingstick Pheasant was found in the burned-out car on Dec. 29, 2013, according to a news release by U.S. Attorney Russ Ferguson’s office.
The car was parked near Big Cove Road in the Qualla Boundary of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians.
Investigators determined that the fire was intentionally set by Pheasant’s estranged husband, Ernest Pheasant Sr., an enrolled EBCI member.
An autopsy revealed that Marie Pheasant died of stab wounds to her neck and stomach, prosecutors said. Investigators linked DNA from a baseball cap near the car to Ernest Pheasant, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.
On April 7, 2022, after reviewing unsolved homicides in the region, the Bureau of Indian Affairs Missing and Murdered Unit opened a full interagency investigation into the case, Ferguson’s office said.
Police determined that Pheasant killed his wife at their home and moved her body to the car.
“A measure of justice”
On Aug. 16, 2024, Pheasant pleaded guilty to first-degree murder for killing his wife “willfully, deliberately, maliciously and with premeditation,” according to court documents.
“For over a decade, Marie’s family has endured the pain of losing their loved one without justice,” Ferguson said in a statement. “Today, that changed.”
Pheasant, he said, “will pay for his heinous crime by spending the rest of his life behind bars. While nothing can undo the family’s loss, I hope this sentence brings them a measure of justice.”
Ferguson said his office will pursue cases involving missing or murdered indigenous persons “no matter how much time has passed.”
“Staggering number” of missing, murdered Indians
Marcelino Toersbijns, chief of the Bureau of Indian Affairs Missing and Murdered Unit, said he hopes the sentence “helps to provide closure to the family and friends of Marie Walkingstick Pheasant.”
The unit began as the Cold Case Task Force, part of Operation Lady Justice, a multi-agency effort established by the Trump administration in 2019.
The unit addresses “the staggering number of missing and murdered American Indian and Alaska Natives in tribal communities,” according to the U.S. Attorney’s office statement.
Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Justice announced “a surge in FBI resources” nationwide to unsolved violent crimes on Indian lands.
As part of Operation Not Forgotten, 60 FBI personnel will be sent to field offices to support investigations of Indian Country violent crimes. The FBI will use “the latest forensic evidence processing tools to solve cases,” according to the announcement.
The Missing and Murdered Unit will help the FBI.
“Violent crime continues to disproportionately impact communities in Indian Country,” Ferguson said.
Also Thursday, the EBCI tribal council unanimously approved a resolution calling for the creation of a single database of missing and murdered indigenous people, according to a recording of the meeting.
The resolution says indigenous communities, including the EBCI, “have been disproportionately affected by the crisis” of missing and murdered people.
Many EBCI cases have been “unreported, uninvestigated or unresolved due to jurisdictional barriers and gaps in data collection,” according to the resolution.
On March 6, the Cherokee asked people to submit the names of missing and murdered EBCI members to Brooklyn Brown, reporter for the One Feather tribal newspaper, by calling 828-359-6264 or emailing at broobrow@ebci-nsn.gov.
At the beginning of this fiscal year, the FBI’s Indian Country program had about 4,300 open investigations, including over 900 death investigations, 1,000 child abuse investigations and at least 500 domestic violence and adult sexual abuse investigations, according to Ferguson’s office.
Since 2019, the operation has recovered 10 child victims and netted 52 arrests and 25 indictments and judicial complaints.
This story was originally published April 5, 2025 at 2:54 PM.