My daughter was murdered. Families like mine deserve a voice | Opinion

Before my daughter became a headline, she was simply Kiara.

She was a devoted mother of four beautiful children. She loved telling corny jokes and laughing harder than anyone else at them. When she wasn’t working, she wanted to be with her children — watching cartoons, making memories and giving them the one thing she believed mattered most: her time. She dreamed of becoming a licensed esthetician and owning her own business so she could provide for her family while being present for every milestone in her children’s lives.

That is the woman I want people to remember.

On June 10, 2025, my daughter was murdered.

In one unimaginable moment, four children lost their mother. I lost my daughter. My family lost the future we believed we still had ahead of us.

The headlines eventually faded.

Our grief did not.

Like many grieving parents, I wanted answers — not legal theories or political debates, just answers.

Before Kiara’s murder, I knew very little about Washington’s justice system because I never imagined I would need to understand it. I wasn’t a lawyer. I wasn’t a criminal justice expert. I was simply a mother.

Today, I’m still learning.

The truth is, I haven’t spent my days reading legal textbooks or studying court opinions. I’ve spent them raising my grandchildren, collecting petition signatures across Washington and working to build Kiara Sewell Advocacy for Victims and Families of Violence (KSAVFV) — an organization I hope will one day provide support, advocacy and resources for families like mine. Every day has been about surviving, healing and trying to turn unimaginable loss into something that might help someone else.

Along the way, I’ve started asking questions.

Questions about accountability.

Questions about public safety.

Questions about whether our justice system can continue protecting constitutional rights while ensuring that victims and their families are not forgotten.

I know these questions are not easy.

I also know I’m not the only person asking them.

From where I stand as Kiara’s mother, my family was left feeling that the justice system did not protect us. That is my lived experience, and it is what motivates me to ask whether there are ways our state can better protect families while respecting the constitutional rights that are fundamental to our legal system.

I’m not asking Washington to abandon criminal justice reform.

I’m asking Washington to continue improving it.

Can we strengthen victim notification?

Can we ensure that victims’ families have a meaningful voice when decisions affecting public safety are made?

Can we continue evaluating whether our laws strike the right balance between constitutional rights, accountability and community safety?

I don’t pretend to have every answer.

In fact, one of the greatest lessons this journey has taught me is how much I still have to learn.

But I believe ordinary citizens have both the right and the responsibility to ask difficult questions when tragedy reveals concerns that deserve thoughtful discussion.

That belief is why I am working to establish KSAVFV. My hope is to create an organization that provides advocacy, education and support for victims and families while encouraging meaningful conversations about public safety, accountability and victims’ rights throughout Washington.

No law can bring Kiara back.

No policy can restore four children to their mother.

But if my daughter’s story encourages one legislator to ask one more question, one citizen to become involved or one family to feel less alone, then her life will continue making a difference.

I cannot change what happened to my daughter.

I cannot erase my family’s pain.

But I can continue speaking her name.

I can continue asking questions.

And I can continue believing that every victim deserves to be remembered — not only for how they died but for how they lived.

My daughter’s name is Kiara Sewell.

She was more than a headline.

She was a mother.

She was my daughter.

She mattered.

Now I am asking Washington to remember that every victim matters, every family matters and every life deserves to be more than a case number.

Because while I cannot change what happened to Kiara, I refuse to believe that her story cannot help change what happens next.

Taneika Tigner is a Washington mother, grandmother and community advocate who is working to establish Kiara Sewell Advocacy for Victims and Families of Violence after the murder of her daughter, Kiara Sewell.