The Department of Justice has awarded grants to four tribes to help them combat violence against Indian women.

The grants enable the tribes to cross-designate a prosecutor who will pursue violence cases in both tribal and federal courts. The money for the Tribal Special U.S. Attorney program will support salary, travel and training costs.

“We know that violence against Native women has reached epidemic proportions,” Bea Hanson, the director of the Office of Violence Against Women at DOJ, said in a press release. “Restoring safety for Native women requires the type of sustained cooperation between the federal and tribal justice systems that we see in the jurisdictions participating in our Tribal SAUSA project.”

The grant recipients are the Pueblo of Laguna, the Fort Belknap Indian Community, the Winnebago Tribe and the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.

Get the Story:
Tribe to get prosecutor for violence against women (AP 6/6)
>DOJ provides funding for new tribal prosecutors (The Bismarck Tribune 6/6)