AK - Mystery as baby girl found alive in remote home with dead parents

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Mystery of baby girl found alive in remote Eskimo home where both parents were found dead (Daily Mail)
A baby girl has been discovered unharmed in the same home where its parents were both found dead.

Police in Alaska are now trying to solve the mystery of how the one-year-old survived whatever killed Jonathan Paul, 29, and Gina Martin, 26.

The child, named Deann, was rescued after worried relatives went to check on the family in Kipnuk, a remote Yupik Eskimo community of 640 people. Kipnuk is located near the coast of the Bering Sea, about 475 miles west of Anchorage.
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'Nobody knows what happened,' said Gina Martin's sister, Patricia Martin.
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Patricia Martin said she and her mother found the bodies when they went to the couple's home late on Saturday night having not heard from Gina all day.

The door was locked, so Patricia Martin broke in with a butter knife, she said. She couldn't tell what caused the deaths.

'I just took the baby and left,' she said.
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more, plus pictures, map, sidebar, at link above
 
Something they ate that the child wasn't given? Drugs more pure than usual so they overdosed?

I am thankful that relatives went looking. It would have been horrible for the baby to have lain there and no one ever checked.

But speaking of that, what concerned the family so much that they went to the home and broke in?
 
And why did they "take the baby and leave" without staying around to wait for police to show up?? That seems suspicious too!
 
Something they ate that the child wasn't given? Drugs more pure than usual so they overdosed?

I am thankful that relatives went looking. It would have been horrible for the baby to have lain there and no one ever checked.

But speaking of that, what concerned the family so much that they went to the home and broke in?

[bbm]

I'm wondering that too ...

the article says they hadn't heard from Gina all day ... well, I can go weeks (sometimes months!) without speaking to various members of my immediate family and no one sends out the calvalry for me

maybe she was supposed to meet them for an important event or maybe they're an incredibly close family who texts/calls a lot (?)
 
And why did they "take the baby and leave" without staying around to wait for police to show up?? That seems suspicious too!

Maybe, they were so upset from discovering the bodies they had to leave. IDK, but I wouldn't want to stay and look at my sister's body.

Wonder how far away Gina's home was from the sister's? If it's that remote, she must have been really worried to go to the home. The weather in Alaska is another issue. Wonder what the forecast was? I've seen specials on Alaska and if the weather is really bad, it is very difficult to travel.

Another question: With the weather in Alaska wouldn't there be a lot of problems with the phone lines? Curious because when we have bad weather where I live, the phone lines and power can go quickly.

They got worried when they didn't her from Gina on Saturday. So I wonder when they last talked to her? If they talked to her on Friday, it wouldn't be that shocking that the child was still in good health.

Sad. But happy the baby is at least okay.
 
Although she is so young she still will probably suffer some kind of trauma. I don't know if they celebrate Christmas but what a thing to be brought up with, knowing that your parents died a week or so before Christmas or some other holiday. I just hope she is brought up with good people who give her a steady and loving home.
 
Kipnuk Deaths: Alaska Troopers Say Couple Died of Gunshot Wounds
Two people found dead in Kipnuk on Sunday died as result of gunshot wounds, according to Alaska State Troopers on Friday.
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Alaska State Troopers from Bethel and from the Alaska Bureau of Investigation have spent several days investigating the deaths this week, and are still determining what happened on Friday and Saturday the may have contributed it to the Martins’ deaths.
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a bit more at ktuu.com link; article is from 12.23 but most recent I've found

Interesting look at recent rash of area deaths involving parents and young children:

Update: Death investigations in Western Alaska
 
[bbm]

I'm wondering that too ...

the article says they hadn't heard from Gina all day ... well, I can go weeks (sometimes months!) without speaking to various members of my immediate family and no one sends out the calvalry for me

maybe she was supposed to meet them for an important event or maybe they're an incredibly close family who texts/calls a lot (?)

I live a state away from my immediate family -
I talk with my mom daily
and text or email with my brother daily - if not a phone call.

Not long talks - just quick hello's how are ya?
When my daughter was an infant the calvary would have been sent too.
 
I live a state away from my immediate family -
I talk with my mom daily
and text or email with my brother daily - if not a phone call.

Not long talks - just quick hello's how are ya?
When my daughter was an infant the calvary would have been sent too.

My adult children talk to me daily on the phone. If it is just a quick hello and goodbye. My Son learned the hard way while he was in college that when I didn't speak to him one day and going into the next day neither I or his sisters had spoke to him, I called the police, I called the college and college security. I recieved a phone call from DS about 20 minutes later. He was mortified that people came pounding on his dorm door...but I got a phone call and he was fine and that is all I cared about.
Maybe this family was one that spoke to one another daily and living in Alaska in a remote area could bring all kinds of problems, the family felt compelled to check on their loved ones. IDK, just thankful the baby is okay.
 
I am sorry to hear this story, the Yup'ik community is a close one and the loss of these young people impacts the entire community. At least the baby has survived. In their culture when a person dies, the next birth in the community takes the first name of the deceased. A circle of life. One reason for removing the baby so quickly is to keep the young life distanced from the spirits of the deceased.

The Yup'ik culture is, to me, fascinating. Of all the Indian cultures I have studied in university and on my own, theirs' is the one I most enjoyed learning about. One issue in Yup'ik culture is that the younger generations have 'assimilated' and those who have had to go away from the communities to go to school or work have had trouble both in the new environment and then when they return home.

Anthropologist Anne Feinup-Riordan has written a book that was one of my textbooks on the Yup'ik; their beliefs about geese and their integral part in both physical and spiritual aspects was interesting.

http://books.google.com/books?id=Hn...w#v=onepage&q=yupik culture and geese&f=false

Here are some more links about the Yup'ik:

http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/aro...ay-we-genuinely-live-a-look-at-yupik-culture/

http://www.ravenfeathers.com/ravenfeathers2_004.htm

http://www.alaskanative.net/en/main_nav/education/culture_alaska/yupik/

http://www.native-languages.org/yupik_culture.htm

Inuit - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 
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Without witnesses, determining who fired a weapon in such cases can be difficult, said Darrin Jones, an FBI agent based in Anchorage. The FBI is not a part of the Kipnuk investigation.

The crime-scene analysis may not give a full answer. Even a gun residue test is not a sure answer because firing a gun can leave residue over a wide area, Jones said.

"In some cases, you're never able to say with absolutely certainty," he said. "Sometimes you just can't be 100 percent certain."
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http://www.newsminer.com/pages/full...s+in+Kipnuk &id=16923411&instance=alaska_news
 

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