Montana DOC Reaches Out To Native Americans
The Great Falls Tribune has a long and fascinating article about how the Montana DOC is reaching out to Native American inmates. These are merely excerpts.
Indians make up about 7 percent of the state’s population, but represent a much larger chunk of the prison population. Among men, 19.5 percent of inmates are Native American. At the women’s prison, Indians made up just more than 27 percent of the inmate population in 2008. Felony crimes on Indian reservations are prosecuted by the federal government, so those offenders would have nothing to do with the Montana Department of Corrections. Even so, many Native American inmates in Montana’s corrections system are steeped in traditional culture, said Myrna Kuka, American Indian liaison for the DOC …
A good example of that effort is the DOC’s policy regarding inmates attending funerals. Previously, the policy allowed inmates to attend funerals only for a few relatives — brothers, sisters, parents, grandparents.In Native American culture, however, family structure tends to be less clear. It’s more common for a neighbor to take on the role of a grandparent or a cousin to be as close as a brother, Kuka said. Yet policy prohibited inmates from attending those funerals … The policy is more flexible now, including a provision that allows inmates to designate at the beginning of their sentence whose funeral would be important for them to attend …
The state’s three largest prison facilities have sweat lodges where inmates can hold religious services. At the Montana State Prison in Deer Lodge and some other facilities, inmates also are able to participate in pipe ceremonies, drum ceremonies, smudging and talking circles.