Women from American Indian and Alaskan Native backgrounds are more likely to suffer sexual assault and domestic violence than any other group of women in the United States. To combat the problem, Attorney General Eric Holder announced today that the Office on Violence Against Women (OVW) has awarded more than $6.7 million in Recovery Act funds to seven tribal governments and 10 tribal coalitions in eight states.
But addressing the problem won't end with the distribution of these funds. The Justice Department is organizing the 2009 Tribal Nations Listening Conference Tuesday and Wednesday in Seattle, which will feature sessions with tribal leaders and law enforcement experts. The conference and the funding are efforts of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, enacted by President Obama. The act provides OVW with $20.8 million for the Indian Tribal Governments Program to lower violent crimes against Indian women, help tribes use their independent authority to address such violence and ensure that culprits are punished for their crimes.
Violence against Native women is a persistent problem, leading prominent groups such as the National Organization for Women and Amnesty International to get involved. The violence has been able to flourish because indigenous rape victims who report the crime find themselves in a jurisdictional nightmare that Amnesty International has dubbed the "maze of injustice." When such a crime occurs, it may fall under the territory of the tribal, state or federal authorities, depending on the circumstances. To determine which system has authority to investigate the crime, it's first necessary to find out if the victim belongs to a federally recognized tribe, if the perpetrator belongs to a federally recognized tribe and if the crime occurred on tribal land.
Pinpointing this information can actually take much time, delaying the arrest and prosecution of accused rapists. Adding to the problem is that federal and state governments provide far fewer resources to tribal law enforcement agencies than they do for law enforcement agencies in non-Native communities. Because of this, rape victims frequently lack access to the forensic examinations which could lead to the arrests of rapists.
So, why should this problem be of interest to non-Natives? According to the Department of Justice, approximately 86% of the individuals that indigenous women accuse of rape aren't Native American, and tribes have no authority to prosecute crimes committed by non-members. To boot, Amnesty International points out that the historic treaties the U.S. government signed with American Indian tribes "includes a trust responsibility to assist tribal governments in safeguarding the lives of Indian women."
That said, I applaud the Obama administration for attempting to remedy this horrific problem. It's about time the government took action.
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