Final Defendant Sentenced to 12 Years in Prison for Role in Murder and Assault on Red Lake Indian Reservation

ST. PAUL, Minn. – A Redby man was sentenced to 144 months in prison, followed by five years of supervised release, for his role in a murder that took place in August 2019 on the Red Lake Indian Reservation, announced United States Attorney Andrew M. Luger.

According to court documents, on August 12, 2019, Daniel Charles Barrett, 32, together with codefendants Mia Faye Sumner, 22, Alexia Gah Gi Gay Mary Cutbank, 22, and armed with at least one handgun, entered the garage of a residence where Daniel Alan Johnson was known to reside. Once inside, Cutbank fired multiple gunshots, fatally wounding Johnson and seriously injuring a second victim, T.B.S. The three defendants returned to a waiting vehicle and left the scene. A fourth co-defendant, Rose Celeste Siewert, 51, drove Barrett, Cutbank, and Sumner off the reservation to help them avoid arrest.

Barrett was sentenced today in U.S. District Court by Judge Susan Richard Nelson. He pleaded guilty on August 16, 2022, but absconded during his pretrial release, and was ultimately arrested on November 2, 2023. Earlier this year, Cutbank was sentenced to 240 months in prison, Sumner was sentenced to 120 months in prison, and Siewert was sentenced to 48 months in prison.

This case is the result of an investigation conducted by the Red Lake Tribal Police Department, the FBI, the FBI Headwaters Safe Trails Task Force, the Duluth Police Department, the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, and the Minnesota Department of Corrections, in collaboration with the United States Attorney’s Office Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Initiative.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Laura Provinzino prosecuted the case.