Ask an ASAC: Indian Country Cases
In honor of National Native American Heritage Month this November, FBI Seattle's Assistant Special Agent in Charge talks about the Bureau’s work in Indian Country and how we collaborate with our tribal partners to solve cases.
Video Transcript
Public Affairs: All right, Kelly, thanks so much for sitting down with us. We're going to talk about Indian Country today. And it's one of the things that is in your branch. In this state, Washington State, there are 29 federally recognized tribes, and I can imagine that throws up some big hurdles for investigators. Can you describe some of the problems that we have with that?
Kelly: Certainly. Part of Indian Country, one of the challenges is the jurisdiction, and it's not quite as complicated as people might think it is. But generally, for the FBI to have jurisdiction over a crime in Indian country, it needs to be a serious felony. It needs to occur on Indian Country or tribal land. And it needs to involve either a subject or a victim who is Native American. The FBI has responsibility for those crimes that occur in Indian Country jurisdiction. And as you mentioned, we have 29 federally recognized tribes across the state. Many of those tribes have reservation land. They have trust land, and they have properties in ownership, even outside of those two categories.
So there's plenty of places within Washington state where the FBI may have sole jurisdiction over a felony in Indian country.
Public Affairs: Yeah, because some of these tribes have their own police departments. But for a serious felony, the FBI would take the lead in something like that, is that correct?
Kelly: Many of our tribes have their own tribal police departments,and those departments are surely capable of conducting investigations. However, their jurisdiction only applies to misdemeanors and domestic violence matters. So for a case to be prosecuted in federal court, you will need a federal agent to present that to the U.S. Attorney's Office.
When we conduct an investigation in Indian Country, we don't take that over from a tribal police department. Typically, we're working with a tribal police department. Members of those departments know their communities just as well or better than members of the FBI. And so they're valued partners when we are working a case in the relevant jurisdiction.
Public Affairs: Yeah, I can imagine it can be difficult determining jurisdiction initially when a call comes in in the middle of the night that there's been sort of some serious crime because the FBI, you have to determine if the victim is an enrolled member or something like that. So these partnerships are key. Is there a challenge because we have two court districts in Washington the Eastern District of Washington and the Western District of Washington?
Kelly: Okay, to answer your first question, obviously jurisdiction is a challenge. A good example would be we recently had a double homicide that occurred on one of our reservations. The bodies were burned beyond recognition. So we had no way of initially knowing whether the subjects and/or the victims were members of the tribe. So we conducted the investigation presuming that they were tribal members since they were found on tribal land. Ultimately, it was determined that both the subjects and the victims were not tribal members. However, that doesn't mean we stop our investigation. We then partner with the local county and the tribal police department to ultimately locate and arrest those individuals that were responsible.
So I emphasize that point because contrary to what you might see in the movies, when we conduct a case and it ends up not being a federal case, we don't take that case and just hand it off or dump it on another department, we're going to seek justice ourselves, so we will be good law enforcement partners and good partners to the community. So when we initially assess a case, if there's a reason for us to be involved, we will be involved, and we will sort out the details in the jurisdictional matters at a later date.
Public Affairs: I think that's a good segue way because there's been a lot of news and stories about MMIP matters and people feel that law enforcement doesn't care about missing native women. And I think what you're telling us the opposite is true in some of these cases. They aren't resolved right away.
Kelly: Yeah. One of the challenges of being probably portrayed very favorably in movies and television shows is that the FBI is going to solve the case within an hour. These cases are incredibly complex and incredibly difficult. And one of the challenges in MMIP cases is that a victim may not be initially reported as missing.
They may have traveled somewhere. Perhaps they don't want to be found. Maybe it's a runaway. So our involvement sometimes is not immediate because we don't get notified. The other part of that is that even when we are diligently working on a case, we can't always share details.
We'll share details if we think the public can help us. And one of the things that the public can do is provide tips to the FBI. They are the greatest eyes and ears for the community. In one example, we had a missing, actually a murdered indigenous woman. Her case was unsolved for over five years. The FBI was criticized heavily in the press for not bringing the case to a resolution. And in the background, we had agents diligently working and solving that case, and it took five years.
But then the case was successfully charged. So we can't always share the details to protect the integrity of the case. But that doesn't mean that folks aren't working the investigation. Our Indian Country investigators are often our most dedicated agents in this office. They're committed to serving our native communities, and they're invested in those cases.
Public Affairs: Well, I hope that people who see this learn a little bit more. Thank you so much.
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