Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen issued the following statement in observance of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons Awareness Day:

“I’ve seen the tragedy the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous people has inflicted on Montana’s tribal communities, both as attorney general and a former prosecutor in Roosevelt County. At the Montana Department of Justice, we’ve taken important steps over the last year to address it, including working to eliminate human trafficking, a problem disproportionally affecting Native American women and girls. Our commitment to reducing the number of missing and murdered Indigenous people and bringing perpetrators to justice in Montana will not waiver.”

Under the direction of Attorney General Knudsen, the Montana Department of Justice manages the Montana Missing Indigenous Persons (MMIP) Task Force which works to reduce the number of Indigenous missing person in Montana and recently awarded the Looping in Native Communities (LINC) grants to Montana’s tribal communities to support their efforts to identify, report, and find Native American persons who are missing. In October, Attorney General Knudsen launched an enhanced missing persons database to provide easier access and more up-to-date information for law enforcement and the public.

Attorney General Knudsen has made it a priority of his administration to eliminate human trafficking. He has implemented training for prosecutors and law enforcement officers to help them identity and prosecute human trafficking cases. He continues to bring together anti-human trafficking organizations, regional task forces, and others – including tribal representatives – to improve resource coordination, identify gaps in services, and explore policy ideas that can be implemented to fight trafficking.