Barr to unveil nationwide plan on missing, murdered Native Americans

Attorney General William Barr on Friday is expected to unveil a plan to address large numbers of missing and murdered Native Americans. 

The initiative, called the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Initiative, will invest $1.5 million to hire coordinators in 11 U.S. attorney’s offices around the country who will develop plans for coordinating law enforcement responses to incidents where people go missing, The Associated Press reported. 

He will reportedly unveil the details during a visit to the Flathead Reservation in Montana.

The Urban Indian Health Institute has found that there were 5,712 reports of missing American Indian and Alaska Native women and girls in 2016, but that just 116 were logged in the Justice Department’s federal missing persons database, according to a February report. 

The AP reported that the new plan will permit tribal and local authorities to get the FBI’s help in some missing indigenous persons cases. The Justice Department will also analyze its data collection practices to see if there are ways to improve it.

“American Indian and Alaska Native people suffer from unacceptable and disproportionately high levels of violence, which can have lasting impacts on families and communities,” Barr said in a statement to the wire service.

“Too many of these families have experienced the loss of loved ones who went missing or were murdered.”