Phoenix is among 10 FBI Field Offices that were assigned extra agents and resources to focus on violent crime against indigenous people.
Federal officials say the six-month surge called Operation Not Forgotten was the longest and most intense effort to solve crimes against Native Americans.
FBI agents and other experts on missing and murdered Indigenous people helped with more than 300 cases. And they had help from tools such as ground-penetrating radar, underwater cameras and sonar.
The action comes as investigators work to solve the recent high-profile murders of Apache teens Challistia Colelay and Emily Pike.
More Indigenous Affairs news
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After finally being sworn in following a historic seven-week delay, Arizona Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva is using her first legislative act to fulfill a campaign promise she made to tribes in Arizona and across Indian Country. -
Navajo Nation President Buu Nygren ran as a change candidate. But that honeymoon is over. A special prosecutor spent three months investigating Nygren and filed an ethics complaint calling for his immediate removal. Now, the Navajo Nation Council is considering a motion to remove him. -
This is the latest of several waivers DHS Secretary Kristi Noem has issued since this summer. -
Almost 230 miles of the Arizona-Mexico border was lined with a 30-foot steel bollard wall during the first Trump administration — part of a project that cost roughly $15 billion and covered just over 450 miles. So environmentalists breathed a sigh of relief when the San Rafael Valley was left unwalled back then. But that's changing now. -
This newer holiday tradition began with the White Mountain Apache in 2023, followed by the San Carlos Apache last year. Now the state Capitol tree will come from the “People of the Tall Pines” — or Hualapai.
