Photo: Glendale Police Department
Eddie Davis, the older boyfriend of Arizona teenager Alicia Navarro, who was finally located in Montana recently after initially going missing in 2019, was reportedly fired from his job at Walmart after he "became very aggressive" toward other employees, a former coworker told the New York Post.
Davis, 36, had previously worked as a night time stocker before being fired over "angry comments" directed at colleagues.
“He would call younger guys names and stuff. I’m not sure of the names. He was being very aggressive,” said the coworker, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, via the Post.
“Within a year or two, his attitude has changed at work,” the employee added, claiming Davis had worked at the store for more than five years.
The Walmart employee also noted that Davis was invited out to a bar "a while back" and asked by colleagues if he wanted to bring his girlfriend, referring to Navarro, 18, whom he instead claimed was a younger relative.
“Eddie replied saying it was his niece not his girlfriend, and that she was too young,” the employee recounted his colleague telling him. “They were using the cover…about it being his niece.”
Davis and Navarro were reportedly spotted on a Native American reservation said to be plagued by violence, drugs and sex crimes, according to the New York Post.
Photos showed Navarro, 18, and Davis, 36, carrying their belongings from their previous Havre, Montana, apartment to Davis' mother's trailer home on Fort Belknap Reservation last week. Connie Filesteel, a tribal member who was born and raised on Fort Belknap, described the reservation as a dangerous place.
“We have high incidents of substance abuse, drug abuse, alcohol abuse [and a] lot of inter-generational traumas with abuse in general,” Filesteel told the Post.
“We obviously have a lot of real positives but we also deal with a lot of these inter-generational traumas,” she added.
Two Fort Belknap residents were each recently sentenced to 22-year prison sentences for sexual abuse of a girl under the age of 12, which took place on the reservation in 2019. Nine sex offenders are also reported to be currently living on the reservation.
Other incidents include a resident who was sentenced to six years in prison for trafficking meth on the reservation in 2022; one man who admitted to assault with a dangerous weapon after being accused of shooting an occupied house on the reservation in June and another man being sentenced to six years in prison after admitting to shooting up a house with a rifle in February.
Davis has not been charged in Navarro's disappearance, though Smith said he notified local authorities when they cleared the apartment. Police said a man was detained and questioned in relation to Navarro's disappearance.
The 18-year-old claimed she was okay when she made contact with police and thanked them for "offering to help me," but authorities insist she's a victim in the situation.
“To us she is a victim, and we need to provide services to her,” Glendale police Lt. Scott Waite said via the Post, adding that Navarro was unharmed and didn't need medical attention when she initially made contact with police.
On July 26, Navarro, who left her Glendale home on September 15, 2019, at the age of 14, was reported to have gone to the Havre Police Department to get herself off of the missing person's list in order to get a driver's license and begin living a "normal life," according to the Glendale Police Department. Police said Navarro, who was described as having "high-functioning autism," willfully left her home in 2019.
Smith, who lives in the Havre apartment complex, told the Post that Navarro had threatened to "go back" during an argument with a man she was living with one day prior to making contact with police.
“I was here the other day and I heard them yelling. She did say, ‘I will go back.’ But that’s all I heard,” Smith said.
Garrett Smith, who lives in the Havre apartment complex where Navarro and Davis had previously lived, told the Post that Navarro and a then-unidentified man in his 20s had moved into the apartment complex about a year ago where he believes she still lives, despite making contact with police.
“She was asking for directions. She looked scared,” Smith said, adding that it seemed Navarro wasn't familiar with the area. “She said she was walking with her uncle and got lost and she’s looking for 6th Street,” Smith said. “I later found out that she was referring to him as her uncle.”
Navarro was alone when spoke to police and was reported to have "basically" requested to be taken "off a missing juvenile list."
"She showed up to a police department. She identified herself as Alicia Navarro. She basically asked for help to clear her off of a missing juvenile list," said Jose Santiago, a spokesman for the Glendale Police Department, during a news conference via NBC News.
"She is not in any kind of trouble," he added. "She is not facing any kind of charges."
Navarro was said to finally be reunited with her mother, who continued searching for her since her disappearance, in what Waite said was "emotionally overwhelming" for both of them, but didn't specify on how they reunited.
"I can say, for everyone involved, including the detectives, it was extremely overwhelming," Waite said via NBC News.