Justice to Boost Fight Against Tribal Crime

Deputy Attorney General David Ogden: "We're really at kind of a crisis point."


On just a single day this year on the Red Lake reservation in northern Minnesota, police and investigators received emergency calls about a suicide, a murder, three stabbings, two shootings and multiple incidents of domestic violence.

Federal statistics have shown American Indians are the victims of violent crime at more than twice the national rate, with incidence of homicide and domestic violence much higher than the national average.

The Obama administration announced Thursday a new effort to try and combat some of this crime on reservations, where shortages of law enforcement personnel and federal dollars have led to lawless environments.

The top three Justice Department officials — Attorney General Eric Holder, Deputy Attorney General David Ogden and Associate Attorney General Thomas Perrelli — will travel to states with high Indian populations over the next two months to talk to tribal members and crime experts about what can be done.

'Suffering in People's Lives That Is Just Unacceptable'

"It translates into suffering in people's lives that just is unacceptable in this country," Ogden said in an interview with The Associated Press. "We're really at kind of a crisis point."

The problems are not new. In the 1990s, Holder, Ogden and Perrelli all worked on Indian crime for then-Attorney General Janet Reno in the Clinton administration. Many of the same issues still exist, including limited resources, a lack of coordination among agencies and little focus on the issue.

"We have to look at whether we're doing enough and I think it's clear we're not," Ogden said. "I think we can devote more law enforcement agents, I think we can help in the training of law enforcement agents, we can have more prosecutors and I think we can provide more support to tribal institutions."

Increased federal dollars will probably also be part of the equation, Ogden said.

Gang Activity Part of the Problem

Reports of violence on reservations — especially the poorest and most remote — are constant. Red Lake has certainly known its share of crimes. In 2005, a 16-year-old there killed seven people at his school and two people on the reservation.

Gang activity has risen in tribes across the country as drug traffickers have taken advantage of gaps in law enforcement.

Still, little is known about what exactly is happening on reservations or how the incidents are handled. Data has been sparse for decades and crime surveys rarely separate out tribal statistics. Ogden says better data collection is one of the department's priorities.

One of the main problems in reducing crime has been a lack of officers; often a handful of patrol cars will police a reservation the size of a small state.


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