A walk along Highway 16 in memory of a young murder victim drew more than a dozen friends, family and supporters on Thursday.
Carrying posters with photos of Aielah Saric-Auger, they covered 23 kilometres in about five hours, starting from where her body was found slightly more than nine years ago and finishing at the Prince George courthouse.
Auger was just 14 years old when she went missing on Feb. 2, 2006.
Her body was found eight days later alongside the highway about two kilometres east of the Tabor ski hill.
The walk's main organizer, Angeline Chalifoux, an aunt of Saric-Auger, said it was being held to keep not only her niece's name in the spotlight but also those of other victims along the so-called Highway of Tears.
"We need answers," Chalifoux said.
"We want them to keep working on these cases and keep them open."
Chalifoux also hopes the walk will be the revival of a tradition that fell by the wayside with the death of Saric-Auger's mother, Audrey, in 2012.
In 2007, Auger's mother, Audrey, walked 650 km from Prince George to her daughter's resting place on the Driftpile Cree Nation reserve north of Edmonton and did other walks in subsequent years.
"For two years, the voice of Aielah has been silenced so that's why I'm doing it,"Chalifoux said.
The walk is also being held in memory of local aboriginal men and boys who have gone missing or were murdered and whose cases have not yet been solved.
They included:
Joseph James Andrews, the 10-year-old boy who, on Aug. 4, 2002, vanished from his foster family's sight while they were tubing on the Salmon River.
Cameron Leslie Laderoute, 37, who was found dead in his friend's Milburn Street home during the early hours of April 26, 2003.
RCMP have said he died from injuries sustained in a physical altercation, although the exact cause of death has never been disclosed.
