Jennifer Bowman

Battle Creek Enquirer

ATHENS TOWNSHIP — When Christine Lanning walks through SAFE Place's foyer, she braces for heartbreak. She hopes during her visits for board meetings that she won't catch sight of any privacy screens, because that means a woman has come to the shelter to flee an abusive relationship — and her children have, too.

"I'm really sad to say we've had to use the SAFE Place shelter numerous times," said Lanning, Nottawaseppi Huron Band of the Potawatomi Tribal Council treasurer and a SAFE Place board member. "Whether the perpetrator was Native American or not, we've actually gone and picked up some of our women and brought them to the shelter."

More likely than any other group in the U.S. to become a victim, one in three Native American women report being raped in their lifetime and 96 percent say they have experienced other physical abuse as well. In violent crimes against American Indians, at least 70 percent are committed by a person of another race.

For years, tribes could do little to combat the issue. If domestic violence occurred on tribal land and the suspect wasn't Native American, tribal police could only haul the suspect to Grand Rapids and leave it in the hands of federal court.

But that changed in March, when the NHBP completed its adaptation of federal law changes and implemented a code that now applies to its Pine Creek Reservation and FireKeepers Casino Hotel: Non-Natives who are accused of committing domestic violence against their Native partner now can be tried by tribal court.

The new law marked a major step for the tribe's sovereignty. It's only the ninth tribe in the U.S. and the first in Michigan to implement such changes.

"When we actually passed (our domestic violence code) at our Tribal Council meeting, people stood up and applauded," Lanning said. "It was emotional. Because you think, 'They should have that right to do that. It's 2016. We don't have that right?'"

Federally re-recognized in 1995, the NHBP has some 1,100 enrolled members and operates FireKeepers Casino Hotel, the Emmett Township gaming facility that saw more than $300 million in revenue last year. Despite having its own constitution, its own court system and its own prosecutor, the tribe hadn't been able to address certain domestic violence issues because a 1978 U.S. Supreme Court case ruled tribes couldn't prosecute non-Natives for crimes committed against tribal members on indigenous land.

It meant that prior to the signing of the Violence against Women Reauthorization Act in 2013, if a Native woman was beaten on tribal land by her non-Native husband, whether he would be tried for the crime depended on a decision by federal prosecutors — whom the tribe argued have "neither the will nor the resources" to get involved in misdemeanor cases.

Research by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse at Syracuse University found the federal government in 2011 declined to pursue criminal charges in more than half of cases "involving the most serious crimes committed on Indian reservations," the New York Times reported in February 2012. The newspaper reported that they decided against rape charges in 65 percent of cases and against charges of sexual abuse of children 61 percent of the time.

The NHBP had an advantage before its domestic violence code. Its prosecutor, Nancy Bogren, also is a special assistant U.S. attorney, allowing her to review the tribe's cases and determining whether charges will be brought. But that's a rare designation other tribes' prosecutors don't have, and one Bogren only obtained it within the past year.

"(Cases) were prioritized as they are in every jurisdiction but it's a logistical issue, it's certainly a sovereignty issue, and it's also a community issue," Bogren said. "This community has a heightened awareness of the issues that domestic violence creates. Native American women are impacted more disproportionately, and this community is cognizant of that."

Seventeen percent of Native American and Alaskan Native women have been stalked in their lifetime, according to the nonprofit Futures Without Violence. They're more likely to be injured during a physical assault, but just 26 Native-specific shelters exist for the 500 federally recognized tribes.

Most victims not report such crimes "because of the belief that nothing will be done," the organization said.

NHBP Police Chief Carter Bright said the new law gives the tribe more local control.

"It would be if you liken it to Battle Creek sending all their domestic violence cases through federal court in Grand Rapids," he said. "It's not providing the community with good service. That's what we're trying to do. It makes it easier and more uniform."

Lanning said a tribal attorney underwent a lengthy process to adapt the law into its own domestic code. Presentations were made to the tribal community before a council vote, she said.

The changes allowed the tribe to secure grant funding to go beyond prosecution and help pay for advocacy efforts. Lanning said new services will help move people into safe areas, get women and families re-established and get children back into school. Those services are available to tribal members even if they're not living on the reservation, she said.

"We can arrest and prosecute the perpetrators," Lanning said. "If they're convicted, they go to jail. And they're in jail and they have a nice warm bed and they have a clean pillow and they have clothes and they have food. And they're inside from the weather elements. That's not always the case with our victims."

The tribe's new law comes as Native Americans continue to face challenges to their sovereignty. When a 13-year-old Choctaw student alleged in 2003 that a manager of a Dollar General store on tribal land repeatedly molested him, his family sued the manager and Dollar General in tribal court.

In that case, Dollar General v. Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians, the Supreme Court may decide whether tribal courts have the jurisdiction to make decisions on civil claims against non-Native people — and in this case, companies — when they involve indigenous land.

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Lanning said the case challenges the effectiveness of tribal courts — "a precious, precious area for us," she said — and questions whether Native Americans have capable judges and a fair system.

More than 50 NHBP members, including young and elderly men and women, traveled in December to Washington, D.C., to protest as the Supreme Court heard the arguments in the case. NHBP Chief Judge Melissa Pope also spoke during the event.

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"The sovereignty issue is critically important to us," said Judi Henckel, the tribe's director of communications and public relations. "We make it a priority to address those issues, and to support other tribes whose sovereignty has been called into question — because if their sovereignty is called into question, so is ours."

Bogren said the tribe's sovereignty allowed for the implementation of a domestic violence code — "a community response to a community issue," she said.

"Our feeling is any time a person is a victim of any type of crime, we want to be able to have them access services," she said. "And by services, we even mean the court hearing here in their community. We haven't had a huge volume or cases, but it's happened sufficiently enough that we feel strongly that one of the multitude of services that needs to be taken into account is the court process itself."

Bright said the "holistic approach" gives resources to the community to make it better — protection for the victim, possible rehabilitation for the defendant and help for families.

"If these relationships have Native American children, we don't want to break up the family," he said. "We want to get them help so that circle of domestic violence isn't repeated over and over."

Contact Jennifer Bowman at 269-966-0589 or jbowman@battlecreekenquirer.com. Follow her on Twitter: @jenn_bowman