On the Navajo reservation, officers are tasked with patrolling 1,000 square miles of territory. They can travel two hours to reach a crime scene. It's one of the toughest policing jobs in America. Meet a 20-year veteran of the force:
Lojann Dennison was just ending her shift when she took the 10 p.m. assault call. She was tired as she headed out into the profound darkness of the reservation.
Officer Lojann Dennison, 47, is a 20-year veteran with the Navajo Nation Police Department, whose force is 20% female. Female officers can be more effective than men in handling abuse against women, experts say. She didn’t. At 5-foot-4 and with short moussed hair, the 47-year-old Dennison is hardly an imposing figure, but through force of personality and smarts earned in decades on the force, she kept the situation from spinning out of control. Her backup didn’t arrive for an hour.At 27,000 square miles, the Navajo reservation spreads into Arizona, Utah and New Mexico — an area about the size of West Virginia.
Female officers can be more effective than men in handling abuse against women, which is pervasive here, experts say. Recent federal figures show that more than half of Native American women in the U.S. have suffered sexual or domestic violence in their lives. Officer Lojann Dennison, responding to a call in Shiprock, N.M., has duties that fall outside typical rural policing: She struggles with customs that may call for an officer to choose between allegiance to clan ties and upholding the law.
In 1992, Officer Dorothy Fulton became the first woman to be promoted to the department’s command staff, and a decade later presided as chief over both criminal investigations and uniformed patrol. When Officer Lojann Dennison is on duty, she wears an amulet to protect her from dark spiritual forces. When she handles a dead body, she later conducts a ritualistic burning of charcoal and cedar to help ward off unwelcome spirits.
Eventually, the pain subsided. But the episode provided Dennison with new insights into her culture’s ancient beliefs and the risks of tribal policing. Spiritual teachings warn to simply stay clear of the dead, but Dennison often has no choice.
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