Strengthening Tribal and Non-Tribal Collaboration to Address Elder Abuse in Tribal Communities

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to today's webinar, Strengthening Tribal and Non-Tribal Collaboration to Address Elder Abuse in Tribal Communities, hosted by the Department of Justice Elder Justice Initiative. My name is Keely and I'm just going to go over a couple things at the beginning with you to address technical issues if they arise and then give you an overview of the Elder Justice Initiative. So, we just want you to know that your microphone and video have been disabled and they will remain off. The PowerPoint and recording will be posted on the Elder Justice Initiative website in the coming weeks, so keep an eye out. Closed captioning is available via the show captions button at the bottom of your screen. Also want to give a big thank you to our ASL interpreters who are helping us out today. ASL interpretation is available via the interpretation button at the bottom of your screen. And throughout the webinar, if you need any technical support, please use the chat feature to message our technical support specialist, Bess Shetterly, and she will help you out. So, we just want to thank the Elder Justice Initiative for hosting today's webinar. And the mission of the Elder Justice Initiative is to support and coordinate the Department of Justice's enforcement and programmatic efforts to combat elder abuse, neglect, and financial fraud and scams that target older adults. If you haven't been to their website in a while, they really encourage everyone to stop by and take a look. They have a bunch of resources for many different professions. There is a multidisciplinary team guide and toolkit to help you out. They also have various recorded webinars and video series for everyone from prosecutors to victim advocates, law enforcement, and others. And they also have a research section on the website where you can look at the most current elder abuse research. Want to give a quick disclaimer from the Elder Justice Initiative that the views expressed in this presentation are those of the presenter and do not necessarily reflect the views or positions of the U.S. Department of Justice. And now we want to kick off some polls just to get a better idea of who is attending today. So, poll one. So, what is your profession? Are you administrative professional, attorney, law enforcement, medical professional, psychological services professionals, social services, including adult protective services, or victim service specialists? Okay, best when you're ready if you can close that poll. So, it looks like we have a pretty good mix with the biggest being social services, including adult protective services, but also 32% victim service specialists. We have administrative professionals, 8% attorney, and about 1% of law enforcement and medical professionals. Great, so glad everyone was able to join today. Now we'll go on to our second poll. If you are law enforcement, are you with a tribal or non-tribal agency? Okay, best when you're ready if you want to close the poll. So, it looks like 32% are with a tribal agency and about 68% non-tribal. So, pretty good mix. And just one more poll. Regardless of your profession, do you have experience working with tribal communities? Yes or no? Okay, best when you're ready if you want to close out the poll. Wow, okay, so 62% of you have said that yes, you do have experience working with tribal communities. That's great. All right, thank you so much, Bess. And now I will pass it over to Peggy Jo Archer, who will kick off the webinar. Hello, everybody. I'm glad that you guys all made it today. Today, we are going to start our presentation on strengthening tribal and non-tribal collaborations to address elder abuse within tribal communities. Next slide. My name is Peggy Jo. You probably have seen me on a few of these webinars now. I'm the Director of Elder Justice with I-Squared, which stands for the International Association for Indigenous Aging. I'm originally from New Mexico. My professional background has always been in violence prevention, and I've been in the elder abuse space for now five years. And so I'm excited to share my knowledge and information with you all today. Next slide. So as you heard, our organization or the organization that I work for is the International Association for Indigenous Aging. You'll hear me refer to it as I-Squared throughout the presentation. And also, Detective Reed and Judith will probably also reference I-Squared at some point. Next slide. These are the people that we serve. Our resource centers and our organization, we serve not only just the American Indians, but we also serve Alaska Native and Hawaiian Native populations. So sometimes whenever you see our materials, it is very diverse, and it doesn't just focus on one tribal nation, especially in one area. We try to make all of our materials be diverse enough to be able to be used in all of those communities, which sometimes serves, it's really difficult because the cultures are very different. Even if you take one state, like say with Oklahoma, there's I think 39 federally recognized tribes within Oklahoma, and they all have different values, customs, beliefs, and traditions. Therefore, the work that we do is very, we try to be very diverse, but a lot of our work you can take and adapt it to the different communities. Next slide. At I-Squared, we have been around for over two decades. Co-founder, our founders are Dave Baldritz, who is an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation, and Bill Benson. They have been doing work in the advocacy space for many, many years, but they have had I-Squared for about two decades now. We're a small non-profit, however very mighty. We have lots of different initiatives, and so you'll see on the slide we have a brain health resource center that has tons of resources, and I will pop this, our website into the chat once I'm done with my speaking part so that you can see all of these resources. But on our brain health side, there's tons of resources that can be adapted to the various communities around Alzheimer's and dementia, wandering, and I'll let Detective Reed speak a little bit later on wandering, but we have a wandering toolkit through the partnership of DOJ coming out that is specifically for tribal communities, and Detective Reed was very instrumental in implementing that and pulling a lot of that information to produce a really practical but robust wandering toolkit to address wandering in tribal nations. And then on our website, we have tons of caregiving information, and all of this is for tribal communities. We've had focus groups, we've had different communities help us develop this material, so this material is really rooted in the values and traditions of Native Americans, but with that diverse lens. Then we have a lot of information on vaccine, and then my favorite part is the Elder Justice Base. Tons of resources on Elder Justice Base. Our co-founder Bill and Dave have been doing work in the Elder Justice Base for a very, very long time, so you will see a lot of their work on our resources as well. And then something new that we have been doing in partnership with NICOA is the LTSS, and a lot of that is really new, so I encourage you all to go through and look at the new stuff under the LTSS project initiatives. And so I will pop in the website for all of these information. If you have any questions, please pop them in the chat or send them directly to me, and I can answer those around our resources, or if you have trouble accessing our resources, we have information on our website where you can send us emails, or you can just email me, and all of our information on our website is free to use. You can share it. You can download it. You can print it out. All of that information, please use and share widely with all of your partners and your community. Next slide. Okay, and this is what our website looks like. I think our website looks beautiful, so please, if you are looking for us, this is what it looks like. Sometimes if you type it in, you will get different websites just because there's a lot of international associations. I noticed that if I Google it, sometimes it will give me different websites, but this would be the website that you're looking for. Next slide. So here is the initiatives, and you'll see on here I have some of the products that we have, and I know it's very small, and it's just I wanted to show, highlight some of it today. It's the 10 ways to think about talking about dementia, and so there's different back sheets on it and different ways to talk about dementia in the different communities, so I encourage you to go look at those and share them as widely as you can. Next slide, and then I'll pass it over to Judith. So my name is Judith Kozlowski. I'm an elder justice advisor with IA Squared. I have a long history of working in elder abuse and elder justice issues. I am a former prosecutor. I've done some national policy work as well and lots of work in particularly financial exploitation of older adults. Most of the work that I've been doing with IA Squared has focused on something far more challenging, and that is some of the jurisdictional challenges that everyone working in this space faces, and we will talk a little bit about that today, but I think we'll move on and get going. Next slide, please. Judith, I forgot to say one thing real quick. Can you please let us know who you are in the chat and the work that you do in the elder abuse space and how you work with nations, and if you are a nation, tell us a little bit about the elder abuse response in your nation. Thank you. Okay. I think we'll get to a little bit of that because we have been working, and I'll interrupt the flow here to say that we have been working very much with individual tribes who have come to us with issues on elder justice challenges that they're facing, and we're very open to that type of consultation. So let's talk a little bit about talking with older tribal members. Next. Just for a couple of seconds, I just want to just give an overview of elder abuse. As I'm sure all of you know, there's physical, emotional, financial abuse, sexual abuse, neglect, and spiritual abuse. The spiritual abuse is particularly important to be aware of, particularly in the tribal realm because there are many instances where that is not immediately recognized, and I would urge all of you working in this space to include that on your list of things to be aware of, especially when you're talking about elder abuse. And it sort of goes into the next word there, which is polyvictimization. Often in the space of elder abuse and working with older adults, you may be called to a particular case that may focus on financial abuse, let's say, but as you begin to peel the onion and the discussion with that older adult, you will learn that there are many more things going on, and there's often polyvictimization is very common in elder abuse matters. So please keep your radar up and your eyes wide open to be sure when you're having discussions with older tribal members, particularly that you may be learning about more than one type of elder abuse that's going on and co-occurring at the same time. Some of the biggest risk factors for any type of elder abuse are social isolation. Again, another particular problem with some tribal nations, depending again on their size and the isolation of those older members, and cognitive impairment. Even a slight diminished capacity sometimes can create a tremendous vulnerability. Next. So where do you start? Some things to know about, if you can, before you have an interview is, is there a tribal code of a particular nation that you'll be visiting? And if there is a code or a resolution or any type of tribal announcement about their work with tribal elders, what does it say about elders and what does it say, if anything, about elder abuse? We don't find so many tribes who actually use the terms elder abuse, but there could be something in that tribal code that would talk about the disrespecting of an elder and use that language in discussing that with a tribal elder. Next. So some of the things to think about are, what are the, did we skip something here? Okay. Anyway, take a look at, first of all, who are you talking to? And who is the victim? Often tribes will not use the word victim, but you could say the older person who is disrespected in some way or somehow ignored when it came to, you know, particular to tribal tribal norms or tribal ceremonies of some sort. And who is it? Is it one person or there more? If you can get a chronology of events and learn the family dynamics, the tribal norms for those family dynamics can change from tribe to tribe, and try to find out gently what happened. What was the event? And be able to make some sort of description in your head about whether that was criminal or civil. And where is the person who caused the harm located? You need two things. You need to know where the person who was harmed is located and where the person who caused the harm is located. Are they on tribal land or are they in the community or are they off the community? And where was the location of any event? So the jurisdictional challenges here can range from, you know, is there a tribal jurisdiction? Is there a local jurisdiction that might include some tribal, you know, some tribal issues where the state and the state, local state or the local county can work with the tribe in going toward resolution? Are there just state issues that you need to deal with? Or is this a federal case that may cause that tribal member who caused the harm to not be included in what might be a restorative justice? Next. Judith, I just want to share one thing quickly. Through our work, we have found that some of the nations don't have a criminal aspect to their code. And so when we're thinking about elder abuse or elder justice in general, just know that some nations choose to only have all civil code and understanding the cultural aspect to that and the differences. And so that was something that was new to me within the last couple of months is that we were meeting with several nations and we were looking at their elder abuse codes or elder justice work and realizing it was all under civil. Yes. And that goes back to something I was just mentioning that we, and one of the things that's really important, I think, in working with tribes is generally, particularly with elder abuse issues and working with any harm that was caused to an older tribal member, the general response from both community, from the family, from the person who caused the harm and from the person who was harmed, is to seek some sort of restorative justice resolution. And that would be within generally the tribal code, but even that's also possible with joint agreements between tribes and counties and often tribes and states to reach what would be a civil resolution. But it is very much a restorative justice approach because that is generally the way many tribal communities approach this particular problem. So looking at who can be part of this process, there's the victim, the family of that person, and the communities. Many of the tribal communities have special members to assist. They have, although not calling it necessarily, it's sort of a community response, a sort of a mini MDT within the tribe so that someone from each area of specialty can be part of a response for an older adult. There are investigators, of course, they could be tribal, local, state, and federal. Again, looking at where the actions occurred to understand what the jurisdictional aspects may be. Often tribal police work very closely with the state and local police and sometimes with federal. It just really depends on location and who your victim and perpetrator would be. Again, the lawyers generally, if they're tribal lawyers, they'll be civil lawyers. A prosecutor would be state or federal or county in some way. And again, we talked about the perpetrator and what are the social services that might be available to the victim. That would include medical providers and food providers as well as the more traditional social services that we think about and what's going on with housing. Some tribes have specific spaces for elders to live during the process of an investigation of an elder abuse case. It's important to know whether that's available on tribal land and how that would work for that person. There's also an opportunity sometimes for that older adult, older tribal member to say, I don't want these people in my house and to post something on a front door in some cases that say these people are not supposed to be here. And a very sort of a public pronouncement in another way without necessarily going through the general judicial processes that would be off the res but would be certainly consistent culturally with a particular tribe. And the other thing is also looking at what might be possibly some financial assistance. Sometimes there are bankers who have close relationships with a variety of tribes to be able to provide some short-term assistance for those who have suffered some elder abuse. Next. So in talking to an older tribal member or an older adult, what is dementia? We talk about it all of the time, but what is it really? And I'm certainly not a doctor of neurology, but I think these are some good things to go by. It's a decline of mental ability severe enough to interfere with your daily life. Something isn't working anymore in your activities of daily living as they're called. But two of the following are things to really look out for when you're doing an interview. Is there a memory lapse? Is something difficult? Is the person having problems focusing or paying attention in any way? Is there a communication inability? Is it language? Are you not speaking the right language? Do you not have someone with you who may speak a tribal language which you might need for an interpretation to be able to understand what's going on? It's really important to know, especially with elders who may as they age lapse back to speaking in their tribal language more frequently or expressing themselves better in that language. And also there could be issues with reasoning and judgment as well as visual perception. Next. So there are approximately 5.1 million Americans over 65 that have dementia. And that number, as I'm sure you all know, is growing. But up to 90 percent of older adults have experienced at least one traumatic event in their lifetime. And we talk, especially in talking about tribal elder abuse, we talk about the fact that there has been intergenerational trauma for a very, very long time. It's also important to remember that many of the older Indians who you may be speaking to in an elder abuse matter may be veterans. Many, many tribal members served in the military and they suffered all kinds of wartime trauma in addition to the intergenerational trauma that we're more familiar with. So please be aware that although someone may be a victim of one of your cases, you need to understand that that trauma may come from not just a lived experience as an older Indian, but also from other aspects, particularly having served in the military. So what are some of the effects of trauma? And again, trauma can be confused with dementia. So it's very careful to kind of make this distinction when you're doing your interviewing. The effects of trauma can be confusing what is safe and what is dangerous. It can also have trouble focusing or concentrating and difficulty imagining the future, like what might be in the future and what is happening, and extraordinary difficulty trusting others for reasons which I think are pretty clear. But it's important to put this mix of trauma information into your bucket of interviewing techniques so that you're aware of that. Next. So what are some effective ways for listening? I'm sure all of you have learned this, but let's go through it. Maybe one more thing will pop out, or just a reminder. One is being attentive, but relaxed. Always keep an open mind. You don't know what you're going to hear, and you may have to sort a little of that information for some of the reasons we just discussed, but keep an open mind to what you're hearing. Face that person and maintain eye contact as much as you can, but you also have to, in tribal nations, be sure you ask whether or not you can have that eye contact, because sometimes that is not what that nation expects you to do, with an older member of the tribe. So it's important to maintain eye contact if you can, and if you are, if you will, permitted. So listen to the words, and listen to what you're hearing, and make a picture of what that the speaker is saying. Also, don't interrupt or impose your solutions. I think one of the things that I am always and constantly impressed with in working with tribal nations is that they will wait forever for someone to finish saying something, and I'm the person who wants to jump in. So if you are like me, don't. Don't be me. Don't interrupt. Listen as much as you can, because that could be that moment when you're not paying really close attention that you get the nugget of information you need for your matter. Wait until the speaker pauses to ask some clarifying questions to demonstrate that you're actually listening to what's going on, and try to feel what the speaker is feeling, and the fact if you can exhibit some empathy for what's happening, that would be, that always helps to improve the conversation, and give that, give the person you're interviewing regular feedback so they know that they're being heard. And again, this is the thing that I find the most interesting, and sometimes the most helpful in any matter, is pay attention to what is not said, to the non-verbal cues. How is the person sitting? How are they speaking? Are they comfortable? Are they, do they appear to be hiding something just in their body language? They can tell you all kinds of things, and don't, don't forget that's part of the effective listening too. So make, getting the story can take time. I've spent hours and hours listening to older adults wondering when that piece of information is going to come, and it usually does, but it can take a while, and there's a reluctance to, to share, because there's a huge lack of trust, especially between tribal members and any investigative person in any, in any way. It's embarrassment. It's family connections. They don't want to reveal anything, but somehow, somehow you can sometimes find a way to open up that story. Sometimes it can be about if there are photographs around, or something about some family treasure that, you know, or whatever. It, it, I have found great success in commenting on a photograph or a piece of pottery that will open someone up to tell me a story, and then I finally get to where we need to be. So what are the physical concerns you have to have? Their hearing aids, if someone has, is having trouble hearing, are the hearing aids in? If they are, are they working? Have their, are there batteries in there that are operable? It sounds sort of obvious, but it often is overlooked. Again, eye contact is really important in ambulation. What is the ambulate? Can that person walk? What are the physical limitations of, for that individual, and what are the eyesight issues? Is that person wearing glasses? Do they have cataracts? Do they have floaters? Do they have macular degeneration, which is also very common in older adults, and can make seeing you very difficult, and also carrying on a conversation, because the eyesight can be extremely compromised. So what time of day are you talking to someone? Sometimes the afternoon can raise a risk of sundowning, which will bring on all kinds of, you know, sort of accelerated dementia thinking and trauma thinking that might not be useful to your, to your matter, and medication. If someone you are interviewing is taking any medication, have they taken it before you're there? What time of day do they take it? Is it current? Do they have it at all? Has it been taken? Because often that is the case in many of the elder abuse cases, where there's a choice between food and medicine. There are often many cases that I have done, where the perpetrator, and sometimes a family member, will wait until the, as I say, first of the month, until the medication arrives, or they get to, they get it from the pharmacy, and then will sell that older person's medicine for monetary gain, leaving somebody without that. So that's another really important piece that you need to understand and ask gently about. And also, a shorter attention span can also be a really clear indication of depression and anxiety. This is particularly true where you have isolated elders. And the other thing that's very important is, does that person need some food? Do they need water? Do they need some type of food to eat for a diabetic condition or some other chronic condition? Next. So what's a good idea? These are my good ideas, but see if you have more, I always send them in, because I love to be better. What's in your office or your car that you can keep with you when you're doing interviews of older adults, and what are the kinds of things that are important? Again, go back to understanding the culture of where you are. What's the favorite little, you know, the favorite sweet? We have sweet treats on the bottom, but what's the favorite, you know, what's the favorite thing in that tribe or that or that area? What is the kind of thing that people might like? But it's important to have water available for someone, some Gatorade or sport drink, because the electrolytes can really help with focus. I always recommend ginger ale, because people are anxious and talking to anyway, and the ginger can often settle the stomach. Sometimes a soft cereal bar of some sort with no nuts. It's important for diabetics to continue to have something to eat. Sometimes that will do it. We're saying no nuts because of allergies or cough drops or some kind of hard candy, because older adults, as they continue to be anxious or, you know, suffer more anxiety, can often have some sort of esophageal irritation that will make it really, really difficult for them to talk and to communicate with you. Some soft fruit cups are good, and tissues, of course, if you get that far, and some sweet treats. Next. Okay, next steps. So, you've done all your work. You've taken a look. Remember that the most important thing, particularly in tribal communities, although there's, you know, we're talking about this generally in aging, is to know, also someone mentioned, what about a pillow or a chair for an older adult to hold on to? Absolutely. I mean, if you can bring it, and the pillow is something you could certainly, you know, throw in your car. I'm imagining all, you know, people driving on roads in more rural areas, but that would be good. Certainly something that you could keep there in case you need that. It's very important. That's a great suggestion that will go right on my list for the next slide. Thank you. So, remember to stay person-centered, and you need to understand, you know, what does this, what does the victim want? Let's just say it's a grandmother. Grandmothers, what is the tribal norm for taking care of elders there, and what is the best possible outcome for that elder and for that elder's family? Again, we're getting back into the restorative justice realm here, but what is the best solution also for the perpetrator? Sometimes there is an addiction issue or alcoholism, and maybe the best solution is to have some sort of, you know, extremely, you know, some sort of attention for that issue, but also to have that person, if possible, remain with the family. Understanding also the role of trauma in this particular matter, is it, it's not only the trauma the victim may have suffered before this, but the trauma suffered from this particular moment. That also includes trauma that can also occur with witnesses, as well as with the perpetrator, so that's very important to understand who's who and what really happened as much as you can, and you can also have more than one goal or outcome to be successful, and if possible, you know, who's your best team to get the best outcome? Who in that tribe will step up and help? Who in the tribe will be able to have the conversation with the elder? Who's in touch with those elders on a regular basis, and who can help you also find other people that are in touch with that person, but always driving toward the actual, toward the resolution of the combination of what does the victim want? What, because often, sometimes it's just to have somebody out of that house. Sometimes it's to want to embrace that grandchild, for example, but wants to get help for that person, so I think it's really important to understand what that is, even within all of the laws and rules that can apply. Next. Okay, these are some of the federal charges. I think we're going to, wire fraud, mail fraud, you can go through all of these. There's no federal elder, you know, elder abuse statute, so federal prosecutors like I was, you have to be a little more creative in figuring out what you might need to charge in cases like this. Next. These are some of the state charges, which I'm sure many of you are familiar with, and next. These can be both criminal and civil, depending on the particular, well not, there's no civil rate, but there are, you know, for the majority, there are ways of having a civil charge, and instead of a criminal charge, if that's the way the best resolution is going. Next. Sometimes dual charging is a great idea. I did a lot of cases where there was a civil and a criminal case that are operating at the same time. It provided a lot more leverage for getting a resolution, and helped often the perpetrator to get to where that person needed to be for some sort of help, or for some sort of resolution that was acceptable to the family and the tribe as well. The disadvantages of it, it is often viewed as, well, they didn't really do anything to me, so they couldn't have sent this, couldn't be very serious, so I think there's always that mix that has to take place. Next. So forfeiture, restitution, and reimbursement are also other ways that are available. This can be, and in some rare moments, it is part of a, in the tribal resolutions and tribal codes there, and also it can be civil or criminal, local, state, or federal, and particularly restitution can be part of, and is often incorporated in restorative justice programs. The tribes feel very strongly if there's a, like, again, we'll just say the errant grandson who stole money from his grandmother. In the course of resolving that matter, that person, that grandson, would be paying back whatever money was taken on some sort of regular basis with some oversight, sometimes from tribal members, and sometimes it can be from a state probation officer or some sort of joint agreement. Next. These are administrative charges, which also can be brought to bear in getting to a resolution. Licensures, licenses of all sorts, retirement accounts can be also demotions in banks. It can be a benefit, like a health care coverage of some sort, and stay-away orders, and employment probations. Next. So what are the social service actions that can take place? Stay-away orders, as I was mentioning, collaborative responses. It's often, I've read some really successful matters where there is a tribe that has worked very closely with their county to be able to find collaborative responses so that when they have cases that are really right on the line between civil and criminal, that there are mechanisms built between the tribe and the county about how to deal with those things. Again, using MDTs, which often have tribal members as someone to rely on for safety nets of responses, including mental health professionals, which tribal members may not have access to, administrative agencies, and restorative justice programs, all of which can be incorporated in the social service results. Next. Financial institutions are also part of this. Again, this goes back to the old MDT thing where everybody needs to take a look at who's there and where can we get help. Many smaller institutions, too, have some elder client initiatives where they can offer help, particularly in financial exploitation cases. Next. So who's your team? Think broadly. Financial services, other law enforcement, sometimes it's people you don't expect can be really helpful, including the Postal Service. They have been absolutely terrific for me in many, many, many cases. And APS is always sometimes bridging a gap between tribal APS and state and county APS. It's really important to build relationships across those geographic lines to make sure that everybody can be of assistance when needed. State securities, banking, and commerce departments can be helpful, along with mandated reporters in your district, and building multidisciplinary teams over and over again. They can be small, medium, large, and extra large, but and just build someone that you can depend on and whose cell phone number you have when you need it. Next. These are some promising collaborations which can help you. They are, there are promising practices, MDTs. These are sort of the the written version of what I just described. But the most important thing is the last part, which is to create a partnership or partnerships that work in your part of the world. For each tribe, there will be that person who always responds. For each tribe, there will be somebody who knows the mental health professionals. There's somebody who can be of real assistance when these cases take place. Next. Okay, Detective Reed will now tell you how it works in the real world. Hi there. So I'm Detective Reed. I guess we can go to my bio. I've been in law enforcement for 13 years. Last six years, I've been working for Pyramid Lake Police Department. Currently, I hold the role of detective. I also am a school resource officer. I've been a patrol officer. I do our community resource, and I do our grants as well. My big thing with the community is building relationships and figuring out who it is that I'm serving. Those are the people that I'm responsible for. And making sure that you show up is really huge. Not being scared to just knock on a door and say hello. We host summer barbecues each on in each community. So our reservation is 742 square miles. It has a giant lake. It's 30 miles by 12 miles across. And there's three communities. They are about 15 miles apart, each of them. So depending upon where you're at, you could be 40 minutes from that person. If you're out at the lake, you're very secluded in that area. So we can go to the next one. That's our lake there. So part of our thing is the reservation and jurisdictional issues. We border with three different counties. So we have Story, Lyon, and Washoe County. We depend highly on Washoe County for our search and rescue, for any kind of recoveries, anything like that. So they're the ones that we generally call. Lyon County would be our first backup. So if we needed assistance immediately, Lyon County would be there. It would be about 45 minutes though. Cross reporting and multidisciplinary teams. It sounds good. I mean, in theory, it would be a fantastic thing to have the MDT in your area. With turnover rates, it's really difficult to get those to stay. What I've found works the best is reach your community, speak with people, and find the one in the community that is... I always call her the godmother. She just seems to know everything and know everybody, and she can contact anybody. You make one phone call and bam, everybody knows everything. So find that person and make her your friend. Mutual aid agreements are held between some departments and outside jurisdictions. So that's where our counties come in. When we conduct investigations with elders, I look for what's not there. And I think that's kind of the big thing is look at their pantry, look at their fridge. Is there food? Is there water? Do they have everything that they need? Look for items that may have been moved or taken. You can see usually a dust where the dust is around something that was removed. Talk to people. If you give them the opportunity to actually just tell you stories, they will generally tell you exactly what's going on without realizing it. And a lot of times they don't really even know that what's happening is abuse. They think it's just normal. So then we also have tribal codes versus our state statutes. Our tribal code, so our tribal code is actually pretty vague, but it's unlawful to knowingly and intentionally, physically, or mentally abuse, neglect, or exploit an elder person or vulnerable adult. Our statute says that anybody over 55 is considered an elder. The state statute is pretty much the same, but you have to know where you're at. If you're on the reservation, it's going to go to tribal code. If you're on stateside, then you go to the revised statute. Next slide. I guess I kind of went through all this already, didn't I? So some history with our department and our area is our temperature can get really, really cold. So a couple of years ago, we had negative temperatures. It was really, really, really freezing out. And I got a call that there was possibly a woman outside. When I got there, she was an elderly woman that literally fell in between her two fences during a windstorm. And it was, I think, negative 12 that night. And she obviously had passed away. It was very unfortunate. But her grandson was responsible for her care. While he had taken her card, gone to the store, purchased alcohol, and was too intoxicated to pay attention or notice that she had left the house and gone outside to open the gate. At that point, there should be, let's see, we've got elder neglect, exploitation for using her card. Unfortunately, you have to have a prosecutor that's going to fight with you instead of fighting you. But to get that to go through. If it's someone who's non-native on tribal land, like we had a gal that was from Sparks, which is about 30 miles away. She had Alzheimer's and she was known to wander. Her vehicle was located at the most north spot of the lake. It's called the Needles. And about two weeks later, her body was located on the south side of the lake. So our lake actually has what we consider tides. It moves across. So everything that comes from the north ends up in the south. But it's just unfortunate. We had Washoe County Search and Rescue out there looking for her for a few days. Actually, I think they were out there for about a week. And nobody was able to locate her until she surfaced. Next slide. So our MDT is made up of someone from the police department, social services, senior services, victim services, and the court. We try to get together. Again, it's really rough with staffing and everything that goes on and obviously the turnover rates. So we're supposed to meet once a month. Doesn't happen. We probably meet every six months. We have mutual aid agreements with outside jurisdictions such as Washoe County, Lyon County, and Story County. However, they will not respond unless an officer from our reservation is there. So if an elder needs assistance, they won't come out. It has to be a tribal officer. Like I said, our reservation lies within those three counties. When elder abuse is suspected, a report is usually made to social services or the police department. Either way, when one is notified, the other one will be looped into the investigation. The police department will only involve social services if they confirm the suspected abuse or have reasonable suspicion. If elder abuse rises to the level of a felony, we refer the cases to the FBI or the BIA investigators to assist. Our tribal court can only try misdemeanor crimes. We can't do felonies. With our mutual aid agreements with the Washoe County, we can house those arrested for elder abuse. They will not provide any social services or victim services for tribal crimes. So Washoe County, state, none of those will actually assist with the elder as far as victim services go. We have to depend on our victim services. Next slide. So when we get a report, the initial contact will be made with the elder. The detective will speak to the elder in a manner that allows them to feel comfortable and confident in providing the information requested. I always tell people when they're talking to elders, meet them where they're at. If they're not talking to you, maybe they can't. Maybe they don't feel comfortable. Maybe they're not in a position or there's someone there that makes them feel that they're not safe to say what they need to say. If the elder is unwilling or unable to provide the information, take a look around. Does the elder have heat, food, running water, clean clothes? How's their hygiene? Do they smell? I mean, you don't want to be rude, obviously, however, but you know, take a look at that. Is there anything out of place, missing items, dust around? Things like that. Ask family and neighbors. Is there anything unusual? Is there anything outside of the norm? Don't just ask one person. Get multiple perspectives. Our tribe has a daily meal delivered to elders during the week. Talk to the driver and ask, have they seen anything? They're going to be the ones that see them the most. And get proactive. Get to know the elders in your area. It's okay to knock on doors, say hello, listen to their stories. You never know. They may tell you about abuse, not knowing it was abuse. Just by being available in the community, you provide them with the human behind the vest. Be that person. Next slide. So, here's the difference between our tribal code versus state. So, tribal codes, a law and order committee creates those. And then they have to be approved through the court. And then the court sets what the bail will be. Nevada Revised Statute is what we charge to all non-Natives committing crimes on the reservation, whether traffic, civil, or criminal. We side into four non-Native courts, which are the Second Judicial Court. That's only felonies. Reno Municipal Court, Sparks Judicial Justice Court, and Wadsworth Justice Court. Pyramid Lake Tribal Court is only for Native crimes or civil citations for non-Natives. Our Tribal Elder Code, I read it to you guys earlier, it's causing any, basically, any mental neglect, or sorry, mental abuse, physical abuse, neglect, exploitation of anybody who's older or vulnerable. All right. Next slide. And I think this goes to Peggy. Okay. So, now, just during the resources. Okay. So, here are some resources to take a look at. Next. Whoops. Do we have some? Okay. So, some of the resources I just wanted to mention to you are the Tribal Law and Policy Institute. You can also take a look at our website, which Peggy started at IA2. The National Council on American Indians, NCAI, also has really good information. But for these more specific sort of law enforcement and jurisdictional questions, the Tribal Law and Policy Institute has some wonderful things. Unfortunately, I noticed, as I read through just about everything, that there's not as much on Elder Codes as I had hoped for tribes. And we actually have the highest number on our website if you need to take a look at something like that. Thank you. Sorry. I just noticed that somebody said something about speaking more about spiritual abuse. So, our tribe, we traditionally have, it's sage when we do our smudging. But some tribes nearby, they use, like, different tobaccos, things like that. So, I keep smudge kits in my car. That's one of my go-to things. I always keep all kinds of smudge sticks in there, just so that, depending upon where they're from, that they can feel that they have that there. Yeah. And just like Detective Reed mentioned, is that spiritual abuse can look different depending on the nation that you're working with. And just like she said, they're all different in her area and that area of Nevada. So, something that you can do to ensure that you're capturing spiritual abuse experiences is when the elder is, during your interview, and the elder is sharing experiences with you, you might not understand the depth of that experience. But something that you can do, and we call that cultural humility and that sensitivity, is go into that interview and ask questions. Ask them, hey, you mentioned this. And maybe even use their same words and say, you said this. What does that really mean? How does that impact you? And the best practices is that their experience might not mean something to you, but it means something to them, right? So, really try to unpack that. And oftentimes, when you don't understand it and it's around culture and more around that cultural values and beliefs, it might be an experience of elder spiritual abuse. But you really have to ask those questions. You have to acknowledge in that setting, like, hey, you said this, but can you tell me what that means to you? How that impacted you? Because spiritual abuse impacts a person's spiritual connection or the way that they connect to that spiritual connection. And that can look different. And so, spiritual and religion often gets intertwined as well. So, sometimes they might mean both. And you might have to really ask questions and really continue on in that aspect of the investigation to understand what they mean, because sometimes that religious piece and spiritual piece get connected, but they are vastly different. And the other thing often in spiritual abuse, it is, well, often family members who are charged with the care of an older tribal member don't feel like going to a particular ceremony because they're not interested, but missing that ceremony for that elder is devastating. And it's very important to go back to Peggy Jo's point to understand what the importance of a particular ceremony, whether that, you know, how much that mattered and the impact on that older adult of missing that. And then one more thought on that is that if you go back to the historical trauma piece where culture was not allowed to be shared or talked about or practiced, depending on the elder, if they had a boarding school experience or even if they didn't, it's just that historical trauma that is passed on, sharing your culture or trying to advocate for practicing culture has been something that has been taken away or been forbidden for many years through that historical trauma piece and that boarding school experience. So it's not just easy for an elder to advocate on behalf of themselves for their spiritual needs. And sometimes they might even drop a hint just to see your reaction, to see if it's safe. But again, having that cultural humility and sensitivity going into those interviews with tribal elders is going to save you, is going to be the best thing you can do. And what that means, I know a lot of people ask me, what does cultural humility and sensitivity even mean? It means just asking questions and acknowledging that you don't know. You don't know what they're sharing with you, because I work with many nations. Even in a week, I can work with five different nations, and I'm not an expert in any of their cultures. I have to ask questions. I learn. I read. I have to figure that out just like anyone else does. And just because you, if you are a tribal member, that doesn't mean that you're also an expert in every tribal culture. Well, and obviously I'm non-native, so I get to, I learn from everybody. So I ask a lot of questions and I found that the best way to learn is to just honestly talking to elders. I love it. Their stories are incredible. Their strength absolutely amazes me sometimes. And I got to learn about the boarding schools from an elder. She told me all about it, and it's a very sad thing. But I get to appreciate a different side of it, I guess, is my point. It's an awesome thing to get to know them. Yeah. And I think this gets back to what all of us are saying directly or indirectly, is building trust is the most important thing that you can do with any tribal community, because you're not going to learn very much without that trust. And they have to understand that you are really, truly interested in them and really, truly interested in solving whatever that problem is to be able to make lives better. But really important to build that trust. And sometimes it takes a long time, one very small step at a time, but worth it in so many ways. And creating that trust isn't just a one meeting. It means an authentic approach to creating trust. It means that you're actually showing up authentically and willingly, because we all, as just normal humans, we know who's there just to get a job done or just to do what they need to do. But that's not going to help in terms of doing investigations or creating good partnerships with nations. Go in there authentically and with that sensitivity. I think that's all we have today. Please fill out that evaluation, and I'll pass it over to Keeley if there's any other reminders or any other questions that we might have forgot. Thank you so much, Peggy. So just what you're seeing on your screen, we would really appreciate if you could complete the evaluation. Just let us know how the presenters did and what you think of the content from today. And we thank you so much for attending and hope you all have a great day.