Five years to the day Navajo elder Ella Mae Begay disappeared, the man who acknowledged beating her and leaving her on the side of the road is free from prison.

The only person ever charged in the unsolved 2021 disappearance of Navajo elder Ella Mae Begay has been sentenced to five years in federal prison.

A man charged in the disappearance of a Navajo grandmother has pleaded guilty to robbery as part of a second plea agreement.

A federal judge in Phoenix has rejected a plea agreement that would have allowed a man who acknowledged beating a Navajo elder and leaving her for dead to avoid more prison time.