Tackling Crime on Native American Reservations

When thinking about violent crime in the U.S., it's easy to conjure up images of big metropolises and inner-city environs. Rarely do Native American reservations come to mind.

Actually, though, violent crime rates on Native American reservations are more than twice the national average. At current rates, one in three women on reservations will be raped and 40% will be victims of domestic abuse in their lifetimes.

The federal government has the jurisdiction to prosecute such violent crimes, but the decades of neglect on reservations have devastated law enforcement efforts, with more than 50% of violent crime going unprosecuted in recent years.

There could be improvements on the way, though. On Friday, President Obama signed a long-awaited law that will address crime on reservations, through smart and necessary expansions of resources, oversight and training.

Rather than longer sentences and bigger prisons, the new law centers on more support for law enforcement resources and training. It creates a unit at the Department of Justice to focus on enforcing tribal law,  and also devotes resources to train tribal police on investigating sexual assaults. There's a modest one sentencing expansion — which allows tribal police to arrest non-natives and tribal courts to hand down sentences of up to three years (up from the current one-year maximum) — but one that's necessary to deal with the existing crime epidemic.

Editorials this weekend from the Indian Country Today, the Tulsa World, and the New York Times rightfully praise the new law as a step toward equal justice for the 1.5 million Native Americans who live on reservations across the country.

Of course, life on reservations shouldn't be simply seen as bound up in violence, poverty and desperation. Ashley Eberhart, who lives on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, wrote last week on the U.S. Poverty blog that while addiction, abuse, gangs and poverty often dominate the media's depiction of reservations, we shouldn't forget that life on reservations is also rich with tradition and community. (For more on life on the Pine Ridge Reservations, check out her posts.)

In order that these traditions remain for generations to come, however, Native American reservations need safety and justice. Kudos to the Obama administration for taking a first step.

Photo Credit: Wolfgang Staudt