An Ongoing Struggle: Police Brutality and Native Americans
By: William Rauschenberg
Per capita, Native Americans are among the most common victims of police violence of any minority group in the United States.[1] Depending on the year and statistics used, Indigenous Americans are either the most at risk or second behind Black Americans.[2] This is a striking figure that, like many Indian issues, is under-discussed in conversations about policing in America.
The history of Native Americans and American Police is fraught with violence on the part of the latter. The United States Army used to round up Indians and confine them to reservations, with White officials free to enter reservations and impose their own vision of justice on the inhabitants.[3] Law enforcement intervened only sporadically, and often in the interests of something other than justice.[4] Given the history, it is little surprise that distrust of law enforcement runs high in Native American communities.[5] It was not until the 1930s that Tribes gained the ability to police themselves,[6] and even then they continue to be subject to outside jurisdiction on many issues.[7]
Indian reservations have high degrees of substance abuse and poverty,[8] which is often associated with high levels of police violence.[9] In 1973, protests against Oglala Lakota leadership resulted in violent crackdowns by tribal authorities on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.[10] This provoked the Wounded Knee Occupation, which ended with federal intervention, and two Indians shot and killed by federal law enforcement.[11] Tribal police have been implicated in police killings more recently as well.[12] Although Tribal Police are increasingly Indian in composition, they retain disproportionate numbers of White officers from outside the reservation, which can create tensions with the communities they are supposed to serve.[13]
However, plenty of violence occurs off reservation. During the 1950s and 1960s, the federal government moved to terminate tribal sovereignty and encouraged Indian migration to urban areas.[14] For many who moved to the cities, urban life brought poverty, substance abuse, and police brutality. One of the first actions taken by the then-newly formed American Indian Movement (AIM) in 1968 was to monitor police brutality against Native Americans in Minneapolis.[15] The suspicion of local law enforcement is not unwarranted; in 2023, the Department of Justice found that the Minneapolis Police Department discriminated against Native Americans.[16] From 2016 to 2022, Native Americans were stopped at higher rates by police than Whites, and subjected to violence more often during stops.[17] Training programs to reduce police violence, already of dubious value, are not always tailored towards Indians living in urban areas.[18]
The problem of police brutality follows Native Americans no matter where they live, and presents an obstacle towards righting any of the historic wrongs done against the community by American governments, federal, state and local.
In recent years there is increasing public debate about police violence and avenues of change.[19] But these conversations have been sorely lacking in Indigenous voices thus far.
There are several possible ways to address the issue of police violence against Native Americans in particular. One is by tackling alcoholism and other chemical dependency issues among Native Communities, which is linked to police violence.[20] This could come from targeted programs and increased funding for rehabilitation facilities.[21] On a similar note, reducing poverty could contribute to reducing police violence.[22] Both of these solutions would reduce contact with police, lowering opportunities for violence.
Law enforcement violence against Native Americans must also be placed in the wider context of law enforcement violence against other communities. 31% of Native Americans identify as Latino or Hispanic.[23] Nearly 300,000 Native Americans are Black.[24] Addressing violence against all will help reduce violence against Indians.
One interesting angle unique to Indian Country is the potential for Tribes to pursue changes to law enforcement on their own terms. As sovereign nations, tribes have wide powers in how they police themselves, and have traditions of justice distinct from western ideas about policing.[25] It would be impossible to summarize all of the diverse traditions in this space, but cultural practices could help mold a less violent form of law enforcement.[26] The Yurok Tribe in California, for example, places a focus on making sure the legal system is staffed with people familiar with the entire community.[27] The Fort McDowell Yavapai Nation in Arizona makes Tribal Police Officers part of its Wellness Court Program, focusing more on rehabilitation and reconciliation than retribution.[28]
Some tribes have already begun to engage with activists, and make changes to their law enforcement practices. Support from state and federal governments also creates opportunities for progress.[29] Tribes have prioritized hiring members as tribal police and given the small size of some reservations, which could be a step towards community policing.[30] Tribes with small police forces have a unique ability both to engage every officer with the community events while also allowing for continual civilian oversight.[31]
Policing in America has harmed many people, and discussions about that topic have breezed past Indigenous Communities. No matter where they live, Native Americans have been killed by Law Enforcement, and action is needed to stop that.
[1] Stephanie Woodard, The Police Killings No One is Talking About, In These Times, https://inthesetimes.com/features/native_american_police_killings_native_lives_matter.html (Oct. 17, 2016).
[2] Mike Males, Who are Police Killing?, Center on Juvenile & Criminal Justice, https://www.cjcj.org/news/blog/who-are-police-killing-2 (Aug. 26, 2014).
[3] 18 U.S.C. § 1153.
[4] E.g., Ellin Stein, What’s Fact and What’s Fiction in Killers of the Flower Moon, Slate, https://slate.com/culture/2023/10/killers-flower-moon-movie-true-story-osage.html (Oct. 23, 2023) (showcasing Osage struggles with the law).
[5] Id.
[6] 25 U.S.C. § 2802.
[7] 18 U.S.C. § 1153 (gives Federal Government jurisdiction over “major crimes” such as murder and rape).
[8] American Indians and Alaska Natives – By the Numbers, Department of Health & Human Services, https://www.acf.hhs.gov/ana/fact-sheet/american-indians-and-alaska-natives-numbers (last visited Feb. 26, 2024).
[9] See generally, Chelsea Marseille, Police Brutality Responses Then and Now: The Effect Poverty, Demographics and Police Funding has on Police Brutality Response to Civil Rights Movements (May 2022) (Honors Thesis, Univ. at Albany), https://scholarsarchive.library.albany.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1012&context=honorscollege_pad (non-White, poverty impacted areas have higher rates of police violence).
[10] American Indian Movement occupies Wounded Knee, Native Voices – NIH, https://www.nlm.nih.gov/nativevoices/timeline/535.html (last visited Feb. 27, 2024).
[11] Id.
[12] Vonnai Phair, Chehalis tribal police fatally shoot man inside Lucky Eagle Casino, Seattle Times, (Dec. 11, 2023) https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/law-justice/chehalis-tribal-police-fatally-shoot-man-inside-lucky-eagle-casino/.
[13] Steven Perry & Michael Field, Tribal Law Enforcement in the United States, 2018, 9 (2023) (https://bjs.ojp.gov/library/publications/tribal-law-enforcement-united-states-2018).
[14] Anderson et al, American Indian Law: Cases and Commentary, 138 (2019).
[15] Brianna Wilson, AIM Patrol, Minneapolis, Minnesota Historical Society. http://www.mnopedia.org/group/aim-patrol-minneapolis (last visited Feb. 29, 2024).
[16] Department of Justice, Investigation of the City of Minneapolis and the Minneapolis Police Department, 31 (June 2023).
[17] Id. at 32.
[18] E.g., Char Adams, Experts stress that more training won’t eradicate police violence, NBC News, (Apr. 15, 2021) https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/experts-stress-more-training-won-t-eradicate-police-violence-n1264092; see also Calvin K. Lai & Jaclyn A. Lisnek, The Impact of Implicit-Bias-Oriented Diversity Training on Police Officers’ Beliefs, Motivations, and Actions, 34 Psychological Science 424 (presenting evidence that while more aware of their biases, officers with diversity training did not substantially alter their long term behavior).
[19] Gary Langer, Confidence in police practices drops to a new low: POLL, ABC News (Feb. 3, 2023), https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/confidence-police-practices-drops-new-low-poll/story?id=96858308.
[20] Hannah Cooper, War on Drugs Policing and Police Brutality, 50 Substance Use & Misuse 1188 (2015).
[21] See Fred Beauvais, American Indians and Alcohol, 22 Alcohol Health Res World 253 (1998).
[22] See generally, Chelsea Marseille, Police Brutality Responses Then and Now: The Effect Poverty,
Demographics and Police Funding has on Police Brutality Response to Civil Rights Movements (May 2022) (Honors Thesis, Univ. at Albany).
[23] Sánchez-Rivera et al. A Look at the Largest American Indian and Alaska Native Tribes and Villages in the Nation, Tribal Areas and States, Census Bureau (Oct. 3, 2023) https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2023/10/2020-census-dhc-a-aian-population.html.
[24] Census Table P1, Race https://data.census.gov/table/DECENNIALPL2020.P1?q=P1:%20RACE&g=010XX00US (last visited Feb. 28, 2024).
[25] See Tribal Justice (Public Broadcasting Service, 2017) https://www.pbs.org/pov/films/tribaljustice/.
[26] Id.
[27] Id.
[28] Department of Justice, Promising Practices in Tribal Community Policing 28 (2016) https://www.theiacp.org/sites/default/files/all/t/TribalCOPSFinal.pdf.
[29] Lauren Paterson, Local control, better recognition of tribal police could solve more MMIP cases, Northwest Public Broadcasting Service (Nov. 3, 2023)
[30] Steven Perry & Michael Field, Tribal Law Enforcement in the United States, 2018, 9 (2023) (https://bjs.ojp.gov/library/publications/tribal-law-enforcement-united-states-2018) and American Indians and Alaska Natives – By the Numbers, Department of Health & Human Services, https://www.acf.hhs.gov/ana/fact-sheet/american-indians-and-alaska-natives-numbers (last visited Feb. 26, 2024).
[31] See generally Department of Justice, Promising Practices in Tribal Community Policing 43-63 (2016) https://www.theiacp.org/sites/default/files/all/t/TribalCOPSFinal.pdf (numerous examples of small police departments integrating with community and oversight groups).