User:Oceanflynn/sandbox/Bernice Marshall

Bernice Marshall is the has served as Chief of the Cold Lake First Nations (CLFN) for two terms starting in June 2013.

Chief Bernice Martial was born and raised on the Cold Lake First Nations reserve, located in east-central Alberta. Martial is a fluent Dene Su’line speaker and traditional knowledge holder of the Cold Lake Dene Peoples.

Prior to that time, Martial served on Council 1989 to 1991 and again from June 2010 to June 2013. In November 2014, Chief Martial was appointed as the Grand Chief of Treaty No.6, making her the first woman in Albert's Confederacy of Treaty Six First Nations, to become Grand Chief.

Early years
Martial was born and grew up in east-central Alberta on the Cold Lake First Nations reserve.

Advocacy
Chief Marshall, Bernice Marshall sent an official request to the RCMP on March 26, 2015 in which she requested the "Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) report on Missing and Murdered Aboriginal Women, as well as access to the National Centre for Missing Persons". In his April 7, 2015 response to Marshall's request, then-RCMP commissioner, Bob Paulson, said that "Aboriginal females were killed by a spouse, family member or intimate relation in 62% of cases; similarly, non-aboriginal females were killed by a spouse, family member or intimate relation in 74% of occurrences." Paulson copied this letter to Bernard Valcourt, then-Minister of Indian and Northern Development, Jim Prentice, then-Premier of Alberta, Michelle Moody-Itwaru of the Assembly of First Nations (AFN), and Lorna Martin of the Native Women's Association of Canada.

Bernard Valcourt, who was federal Aboriginal affairs minister from 2013 to 2015, said that "70 per cent of homicides of Indigenous women were caused by Indigenous men",