Missing Murdered and Indigenous Persons

84% of Indigenous women experience violence in their lifetime. 

Four in Five Indigenous Women

More than 1.5 million American Indian and Alaska Native women experience violence in their lifetime. Many of these cases result in a missing or murdered indigenous woman. This is incredibly gut wrenching. Not only are these women going missing and are being murdered, but in some cases, these women are being ignored and forgotten. There is an extreme amount of mistrust that indigenous people have of the White Man due to the colonization and boarding school, which in turn makes it difficult for law enforcement to assist on some of these cases. Federal law enforcement has to be invited on reservation land and asked to assist in these cases. 

Need for Investigative Resources

On the Department of Interior Indian Affairs webpage, it lists the statistics for American Indian and Alaska Native missing persons who have been entered into the National Crime for Information Center (NCIC) which is approximately 1,500 American Indian and Alaska Native missing persons throughout the U.S. approximately 2,700 cases of murder and non-negligent homicide offenses have been reported to the Federal Government's Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program. The Bureau of Indian Affairs estimate that there are approximately 4,200 missing and murdered cases are currently open and unsolved. 

 

"These investigations remain unsolved often due to a lave of investigative resources available to identify new information from witness testimony, re-examine new or retained material evidence, as well as reviewing fresh activities of suspects."

-Department of Interior Indian Affairs. 

American Indian and Alaska Native people are at a disproportionate risk of experiencing violence, murder, or going missing and make up a significant portion of the missing and murdered cases.

         -U.S. Department of the Interior Indian Affairs. 

This photo includes people raising awareness of Missing indigenous men.

Indigenous men are more likely to go missing than indigenous women. 

They have a tendency to not be reported as frequently because of alcohol and drug usage.