Missing and Murdered Native Americans

From The Epoch Times:

Barr unveiled the Justice Department’s (DOJ) strategy called The Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons (MMIP) Initiative during a visit with tribal leaders and law enforcement officials at the Flathead Reservation in Montana on Friday, Nov. 22. The Flathead Reservation is home to the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes (CSKT). He said the initiative will “strengthen the federal, state, and tribal law enforcement response” to high rates of violence faced by American Indian and Alaska Native people. 

“American Indian and Alaska Native people suffer from unacceptable and disproportionately high levels of violence, which can have lasting impacts on families and communities,” Barr said in a statement. “Too many of these families have experienced the loss of loved ones who went missing or were murdered.” He highlighted how Native American women face particularly high rates of violence, with at least half suffering sexual or intimate-partner violence in their lifetime. According to a 2016 study funded by the National Institute of Justice, more than 1.5 million Native American women have experienced violence in their lifetime. Meanwhile, the study also found that more than 1.4 million Native American men have experienced violence in their lifetime. 

The initiative will invest $1.5 million to place MMIP coordinators in 11 U.S. Attorney’s offices across the country to develop standard protocols and procedures for responding to reports of missing or murdered Native Americans. The states are Alaska, Arizona, Montana, Oklahoma, Michigan, Utah, Nevada, Minnesota, Oregon, New Mexico, and Washington state, the DOJ said. The Montana MMIP coordinator has already started his position. (Read more.)