On Monday, March 17, the second set of human remains retrieved from the Prairie Green landfill was identified to be Marcedes Myran of Long Plain First Nation.
Earlier this month, Manitoba Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) confirmed that the first set of human remains retrieved from the landfill just north of Winnipeg belonged to Morgan Beatrice Harris of Long Plain First Nation.
Both the federal and provincial governments previously committed $20 million each to search for the remains of Morgan Harris and Marcedes Myran. The search initially began on Dec. 2, 2024 followed by the province announcing that potential human remains had been discovered on Feb. 26, 2025.
Harris’s remains were found as part of a search and recovery mission initiated at the request of the families of Harris and Myran. The operation, conducted in partnership with the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs and with federal support, remains ongoing.
Grand Chief Kyra Wilson of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs praised the search team’s efforts and called for wider action.
“I firmly believe that if we were to look in the landfills, we would find other remains,” Wilson said to CBC. “This is a reality.”
“It only took a few months for us to find [Harris],” Wilson said. “If we were to come together to search all the landfills in our region, that we’d probably find some answers to the questions of families that are missing their loved ones.”
Wilson cited the cases of Ashlee Shingoose who went missing in Winnipeg in 2022, and Tanya Nepinak, who went missing in 2011. A six-day search for Nepinak’s remains at the Brady Road landfill in 2012 was unsuccessful.
Harris and Myran were among four women murdered by Jeremy Skibicki in 2022. Skibicki was also found guilty of killing Rebecca Contois of O-Chi-Chak-Ko-Sipi First Nation and an unidentified woman given the name Mashkode Bizhiki’ikwe, or Buffalo Woman.
While Winnipeg police and the Progressive Conservative government initially deemed a search for Harris and Myran’s remains unfeasible, the Kinew government launched the search one year after winning the provincial election in October 2023.
“I don’t think any of us would ever want our loved ones to go through what Morgan Harris went through,” Kinew said to CBC. “However, through this journey we have seen some remarkable strength and resilience and power from the family of Morgan.”
According to Kinew, families of missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls and gender-diverse individuals have been collaborating with undergraduate forensic anthropology students from Manitoba and across Canada in the search of the landfill.
“In some ways the search effort itself is a microcosm of where we’re at as a country,” he said to CBC. “People from different walks of life coming together to try to do the right thing for these families.”
“This search has always been driven by love — honouring Morgan, Marcedes, Mashkode Bizhiki’ikwe (Buffalo Woman), Rebecca Contois and all families still waiting for their loved ones to come home,” said the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs in a statement.
“No family should have to search in this way, yet their loved ones stood firm in their truth and refused to be silenced. It is through their love and determination that Morgan has been found.”
