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David Lynch, Austin Chronicle
July 11th, 2024 at 9:01am“James exudes pure countrified fiddle goodness.”
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Elana James
"A beautiful voice, a fantastic musician,
with the heart and soul of an angel."
-Willie Nelson
Today at 6 PM with Henry Horenstein (plus Lupa and fiddling) in Austin. Join us!
www.firstlightaustin.com
Join First Light Books to celebrate photographer Henry Horenstein's newest monograph, MILES AND MILES OF TEXAS, and the 20th anniversary reissue of his iconic HONKY TONK: PORTRAITS OF COUNTRY MUSIC.0 CommentsComment on Facebook
To all my treasured friends and supporters who contributed to this campaign—and most importantly to my dear friend Nancy Padilla for suggesting it and setting it up--I am so very, very grateful.
To have received this magnitude of love and support from all of you--in only three days!--is beyond what I could have dared hope.
It’s been especially meaningful to be able to be honest about what I’ve been dealing with, and to get messages of support from so many of you from all over the world and all chapters of my life. Some people also have doubted the campaign is real, which is understandable, considering how unimaginably horrible the events of the past year have been, and continue to be. I assure you it is.
I wanted mostly to just thank all of you—whether it was a dollar or a thousand or just for sending love and prayers.
And I have also been grateful for the lesson you’ve showed me again of the power of being honest. I had been advised to keep my head down and not speak publicly about these issues, but that has not been helpful. Now that I have disclosed even a small part of this ongoing nightmare, to be lifted up, supported, and loved by so many of you has been deeply meaningful. I now see that I will stand up for my Mom under any circumstances—there is nothing I won’t do for her—and I'm thankful to all of you in my life who have stepped forward with love and encircled me with support for that.
Your donations here will go toward the court-ordered mediation with her ex-partner, who continues to sue me, on December 18th, 2025, to reach a fair agreement for love and care taking of her dog, Isabelle.
As for the DA failing to press criminal charges against the murderer, this fund has also allowed me to take a first step to explore our family’s options in seeing what we can do to get the prosecutor to prosecute the murder. It truly defies belief that a man who walked into my Mom’s home and stabbed her to death on September 13, 2024, is likely going to be freed back into the Ann Arbor community in just a few years, or less. He is currently on a glide-path to a brief stay in the Center for Forensic Psychiatry, and then likely on to adult foster care and will be released back out into the community soon after.
Neither the DA nor the Pittsfield Township police has allowed us to see the police report, despite repeated attempts to get it through FOIA filings. They have not shared any information with our family, have hung up on us on zoom calls intended to share information with the family, and have told us they will share information about our Mom’s murder only AFTER the “settled record” is entered into the court on January 9th, 2026. We have been told we can each read a “victim impact statement” at that hearing and that is the sum total of the justice we will get for our Mom’s brutal murder.
Your contributions here, and any more that may come in, while they have far exceeded what I dared to hope, will continue to fund justice for my Mom, both in relation to her dog Isabelle and in getting the District Attorney in Washtenaw County, MI, Eli Savit, to actually press criminal charges against the murderer.
Thank you so very much and I will continue to keep you posted.
With love and my deepest gratitude,
Elana ❤️
Dec 4, 2025
Donate to Help Elana James in the aftermath of her Mother’s murder, organized by Nancy Padilla
gofund.me
Hello, I’m a friend of Elana James, and I’m creating this GoFun… Nancy Padilla needs your support for Help Elana James in the aftermath of her Mother’s murder0 CommentsComment on Facebook
DECEMBER 4 UPDATE -- Please click gofundme link below for an update. Thank you!
UPDATE FROM ELANA: As some of you may know, after losing my Mom in September 2024, a lot has been going on that I haven't shared publicly. My dear friend, fiddle virtuoso Nancy Padilla, formerly of Bozeman and now of Portland, generously offered to create this gofundme for me. I am being aggressively sued by my Mom's former partner since April 2025, and my sister and I are now facing huge problems with the Washtenaw County, Michigan DA, who is refusing to bring criminal charges against the murderer. Nancy created this fund to help me navigate these issues, but primarily, to get through this December 18th mediation with a fair outcome for my Mom and her beloved dog, Isabelle. Just wanted to give a little more context, and thank you for even reading.
Donate to Help Elana James in the aftermath of her Mother’s murder, organized by Nancy Padilla
gofund.me
Hello, I’m a friend of Elana James, and I’m creating this GoFun… Nancy Padilla needs your support for Help Elana James in the aftermath of her Mother’s murder4 CommentsComment on Facebook
Good God, Elana, I'm so sorry you're going through any of this. If it comes to it, you might consider going to the press about these awful things. Though I'm sure you'd rather talk about music!
Good grief. I'm in the UK and really have no concept of what you're saying, but it seems bad. All I can send is thorough support and will buy any disc in the future... Ian Leonard
Wow Elana earthshattering hearing this😢🙏 i did not realize that such a tragedy happened to you