Tribe says too many violent crimes – and too few police.
The tribal president of the Oglala-Lakota declared a state of emergency for the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. The reason for this was the many violent crimes and the many missing and murdered people. The tribe is calling on the US government and Indigenous Interior Secretary Debra Haaland to provide more funding to increase the number of tribal police officers..
The South Dakota Missing Person’s Clearinghouse reports 13 people currently missing from Pine Ridge, six of whom went missing this year and four within October 2023. Seven of the total missing individuals are minors.
In July 2022, the tribe launched a lawsuit against the United States arguing the government has failed to uphold its treaty obligation of protecting the tribe. The lawsuit references several historical documents that define the United States’ obligation. The Treaties of 1825, 1851 and 1868 all included clauses that state the United States is responsible for protecting the Oglala Sioux Tribe and its members from “bad men.”
In 2021, the tribe stated that the federal government would only provide 13 percent of the funding requested by the tribe for law enforcement and criminal investigations for the 2023 budget year. Currently, the tribal police say they have just 32 officers, five to six of whom working at one time. How could so few officers patrol the 3.1 million acre reservation?
On November 18, tribal president Frank Star declared a State of Emergency. The new state will remain in effect until January 1, 2025. In his declaration, he calls for additional funding, to increase the police force on the reservation to the Bureau of Indian Affairs standard. This standard calls for 2.8 officers per 1,000 people in a service area. According to census data, 20,000 people live in Pine Ridge, while the tribe claims more than 54,000 residents. Accordingly, it is now calling for the budget to be increased – for 120 officers.
The staff of the Oglala Sioux Tribe Victim Services support the the call for a State of Emergency. On November 16, they called for a vigil for missing and murdered tribal members and demanded an end to drugs and violence. They plan to continue with weekly vigils until something is done about the violence on the reservation.
