By Andrew Hay

ISLETA PUEBLO, N.M. (Reuters) – Detective Kathleen Lucero is seen driving along a dirt road heading into the Manzano Mountains east of a New Mexico Native village when an elder came to her family early in her career. I remember when I told him I was on my way here. he waters the cows he didn’t come back

It goes back to 2009, when Lucero was a patrol member, learning how to stop his fellow countrymen from becoming involved in the MMIWR epidemic in the United States.

She submitted a report on the elder. The police chief told her that it wasn’t enough. Following her advice, she began networking with outside law enforcement agencies.

“We hit it,” said Lucero, a member of a traditional Isleta family. Lucero’s mother was disowned for a week by her mother 17 years ago when she decided to join the Pueblo police force because she wanted to be a “spokesperson” for the residents.

Nine hours after he went missing in Isleta Pueblo, just south of Albuquerque, the elderly man was found by an Oklahoma traffic cop more than 400 miles away when his car ran out of gas, Lucero said. It says. He was showing early signs of dementia.

This incident was an early lesson for Lucero, and he took it to heart.

These days, Isleta Pueblo’s Chief Criminal Investigator, Lucero does not try victims for drug use or flight. She doesn’t wait for them to show up. She launches an investigation, posting their names and photos on social media, calling law enforcement contacts and possibly even TV stations. Since 2015, she has worked on eight such cases, of which seven were found alive and one remains missing.

“Somebody knows someone and I believe it continues to build the network,” Lucero said.

Her missing person prioritization, which is also endorsed by Isleta Police Chief Victor Rodriguez, is not common among U.S. and tribal law enforcement agencies, with more than a dozen law enforcement officials saying the judiciary A maze of jurisdictions and a lack of resources contribute to an estimated 4,200 unsolved Aboriginal cases. policymakers interviewed by Reuters.

These gaps have led the Native American police Reuters to meet to solve the problem on their own, some even forming their own disappearing squads. Still, they remain a minority among the tribes, and law enforcement and lawyers say most tribes lack the resources and personnel to prioritize missing members.

Fueled by decades of Native American activism, data showing the scale of the crisis, and the appointment of Deb Harland, America’s first Native American cabinet minister, the issue of missing Indigenous peoples has become mainstream in the United States over the past five years. .

State task forces, federal and local investigative forces, and data efforts have increased, and tribal and federal law enforcement agencies report improved coordination.

Even federal law enforcement officials admit that the Native American police force is severely underfunded by the federal government, which provides security to the tribes through the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). Many reservations and pueblos face understaffed, substandard investigations, or no missing persons investigations.

Brian Newland, who heads the Bureau of Indian Affairs as the U.S. Assistant Secretary of the Interior, acknowledged the agency’s lack of resources. He said the BIA’s new missing persons and homicides division is looking to better coordinate investigations among federal, state and local agencies and deploy investigators when assistance is needed.

Ms Newland, a resident of the Bay Mills Indian Community (Ojibwa), said in an interview, “It’s very complex and complicated to do policing inside India. I don’t think it’s necessary to tell you what the consequences are. ‘ said. .

exposed to further risk

A variety of factors, including poverty and a history of colonial oppression, leave Native Americans disproportionately at risk of disappearance. American Indian women and girls account for 15 percent of missing women cases in Minnesota, for example, and make up 1 percent of the state’s population, according to the state task force.

“Very few tribes have the funding and staff to make MMIWR a priority,” said Darlene Gomez, an Albuquerque attorney who has represented families in 17 Native American disappearance cases.

This year, Navajo Police Chief Darryl Noon was able to set up a detective unit separate from the police department’s busy criminal investigation team to investigate missing tribal cases, which average about 70 at any one time. “We’ve become more active, rather than sitting and waiting for someone to do something,” Noon said. Navajo lands span parts of New Mexico, Arizona, and Utah.

Law enforcement officials interviewed by Reuters said the frequent disappearances of Native Americans within police jurisdiction outside tribal territories have sparked confusion over who is responsible for the incidents.

FBI data on missing and murdered Native Americans remained largely unchanged from 2016 to the latest report in 2021, with 1,554 people still missing at the end of the year.

New Mexico Attorney General Raul Torrez said law enforcement’s lack of interagency cooperation is the reason for no improvement.

“It’s very difficult, partly because we have to navigate,” said Torez, who worked to establish information-sharing between government agencies as district attorney for Bernalillo County in Albuquerque. It’s all about jurisdictions and legal silos and departments.”

let me take you home

Reuters spoke to more than a dozen families who have reported either law enforcement inaction over the disappearance of loved ones, or a scramble for jurisdiction over the case.

The BIA Missing and Homicide Unit is investigating the 2020 murder of Zakaria Shorty, 23, who was found dead in the Navajo Nation near Kirtland, New Mexico, according to her mother, Vangie Randall. BIA MMU) was blocked by the FBI and the Navajo Nation. – Shorty.

“These agencies cannot even work together to solve Zachariah’s case,” Randall Shorty said.

Raul Boujanda, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s New Mexico field office, said cooperation between the FBI and other law enforcement agencies has improved. He and Noon declined to comment specifically on the Shorty case. The FBI in Washington declined to comment further.

“We are never going to be closed off. rice field.

Victims’ families and their attorneys say police routinely blame missing Native American women for disappearances due to factors such as substance abuse, but not just outsiders.

A Navajo criminal investigator who claims to be a Navajo criminal investigator says he would not have gone missing if nurse Jamie Yazee, a member of the tribe, had stayed home and cared for the children, Reuters reported. I listened to the December recording. The conversation was recorded by a person who requested anonymity to speak to investigators on behalf of the family. Reuters was unable to confirm the identity of the investigator.

Yazie’s body was found a year later on a Hopi reservation. Her boyfriend Tre James was charged with murdering her in 2022.

Navajo Police Chief Noone said investigators’ comments were alarming. Tribal Criminal Investigation Director Michael Henderson declined to comment.

Lucero said one of the main reasons families did not report their loved ones missing as soon as possible was because the police were trying to bring the victims to justice.

Lucero, whose daughter is also a police officer, said, “I don’t care if you do drugs and leave your children behind.” “I must go find you and bring you home.”

(Reporting by Andrew Haigh, Editing by Donna Bryson and Claudia Parsons)