{"id":29697,"date":"2024-01-16T21:44:27","date_gmt":"2024-01-17T04:44:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mystery-surrounds-farmington-womans-homicide\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T01:01:35","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T07:01:35","slug":"mystery-surrounds-farmington-womans-homicide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/mystery-surrounds-farmington-womans-homicide\/","title":{"rendered":"Mystery surrounds Farmington woman\u2019s homicide"},"content":{"rendered":"Sister asks community for help in solving crime\n

\"Brigitte
Brigitte Johnson, 34, of Farmington, was found dead Dec. 13 in home in Westland Park. Her death is being investigated by the Farmington Police Department.<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A Farmington woman does not want her sister to become a picture on a poster of Missing or Murdered Indigenous People. Monisha Black is speaking out asking for the public\u2019s help to solve the Dec. 13 homicide of Brigitte Johnson.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeing Navajo, your hear those stories of missing and murdered women. I think, \u2018Could my sister be one of them?\u2019 Those cases go cold, and I want this to be solved,\u201d Black said, adding she and her family are cooperating with the police as much as they can.<\/p>\n

Johnson, 34, was found dead by her mother shortly after 11. m. Dec. 13 in her home at 2809 Parque de Oeste No. 3. She always called to check in with her mother and had not called that morning, causing her mother to worry and go check for her daughter at home.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s hard missing those calls,\u201d Black said.<\/p>\n

Black said the family did not know that Johnson had a gathering the previous night at her home. Farmington Police found out about the \u201clarge gathering of people\u201d at a suspected party from witnesses questioned in relation to the homicide, according to Deputy Chief Kyle Dowdy.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t know how many people or how long it lasted,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Black had questioned the idea of a gathering, where drugs and alcohol may have been used, but she also stated that her sister \u201cwas a very private person,\u201d who \u201chad friends she never mentioned to us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dowdy stated that police believe Johnson knew her attacker, and her case does not \u201cappear to be a random crime to us.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite this, police are \u201chaving trouble identifying the offenders,\u201d Dowdy said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have had the opportunity to talk to some friends and we\u2019ve spoken to a couple of persons of interest,\u201d Detective Lt. Shane Goodsell said. \u201cWe don\u2019t have enough to call anyone a suspect at this time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve talked to people who were there throughout that night. It\u2019s still a highly active investigation,\u201d Dowdy said. \u201cWe are waiting for labs.\u201d<\/p>\n

The lack of answers led Black to reach out on social media as well as to the Tri-City Record.<\/em> She wants justice for Johnson, but she also wanted to tell about her sister, who was 10 years her senior.<\/p>\n

Johnson was a 2007 graduate of Farmington High School and a full-time employee at the East Main Safeway, where Black also works in the Deli. They saw each other every day at work. \u201cShe was really small and I would see her forehead above the shelf,\u201d Black said.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was hard working and had a loving relationship with her friends and family,\u201d Black said, adding that she was \u201cfun and outgoing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Johnson loved to go \u201cshopping and window browsing, and spending time\u201d with her mother, Black said. \u201cI can tell you she didn\u2019t deserve what happened to her at all.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since Johnson\u2019s death, Black said she feels like she is sitting staring out a window, \u201cThere\u2019s storylines in your mind \u2026 I want answers from my sister.\u201d<\/p>\n

Farmington Police also would like answers. There were officers called to Johnson\u2019s home at 4 a.m. in response to a noise complaint.<\/p>\n

\u201cNeighbors had heard arguing. It got loud enough to where they called it in,\u201d said Goodsell, who is leading the investigation.<\/p>\n

\u201cOfficers responded and attempted to make contact,\u201d Goodsell said, adding the officers stayed at the location for about 20 minutes trying to contact someone. \u201cNobody answered the door \u2026 they walked away from that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cit\u2019s not unusual for us to show up and the noises have stopped by the time we get there,\u201d Dowdy said.<\/p>\n

Black believes Johnson may have been killed at that time, and the suspect left in her sisters maroon-colored 4-door passenger car, driving away from the scene.<\/p>\n

She mentioned Ring doorbell cameras and said, \u201cI know that someone has something that might have captured this person driving the car.\u201d<\/p>\n

Goodsell said Johnson\u2019s vehicle was seen leaving the residence not long after police were called to the home the first time. The vehicle was found at another location in San Juan County.<\/p>\n

Police also have not located a murder weapon, Goodsell said.<\/p>\n

Black said she will continue searching for an answer to her sisters death, saying she continually wonders who would do this. \u201cI would like to them know my sister was stolen from us,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sister asks community for help in solving crime<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29698,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-29697","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"Website Administrator","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29697","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29697"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29697\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":80829,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29697\/revisions\/80829"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29697"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=29697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}