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fering a skull fracture and other injuries.
• Still, nearly 2,000 cases were declined for prosecution over the two-year span, a matter for which the DOJ has been criticized in the past.
• "There are cases that are legitimately declined, and that is appropriate and expected," said Leonhard, of the Umatilla tribe's Office of Legal Counsel.
• The DOJ's report shows that the cases declined in 2011 and 2012 were mostly because of insufficient evidence. Rates for individual states varied widely -- from Montana, where 52 percent of cases were turned down, to Arizona, where 20 percent were declined over the two years.
• Fred Urbina, chief prosecutor for the Pascua Yaqui tribe in southern Arizona, said monthly meetings between tribal and federal officials provide a good indication of why a case is declined for federal prosecution.
• "We never used to get any kind of declination (notices) in the past," he said, adding, "Now we're in on that loop."
• Federal prosecutors don't measure their performance in Indian Country by declination statistics. Instead, they point to the relationships they've built with tribal authorities and community members.
• "If anything, we get way too caught up in looking at the numbers," said Patrick Schneider, tribal liaison for the U.S. attorney's office in Arizona. Declined case statistics don't indicate "whether we're doing a good job or not."
• Federal authorities report visiting tribal lands more often to discuss ways to combat crime, train police and bring on tribal prosecutors as special assistant U.S. attorneys.
• Grant Walker, tribal prosecutor on the Standing Rock Reservation in North and South Dakota since 2009, said he doesn't put a lot of stock into declination rates because he talks to federal prosecutors on a regular basis.
• The DOJ's declination rate includes cases referred to and prosecuted in tribal courts, where sentences can go beyond the traditional maximum penalty of one year in jail if certain provisions are met under federal law.
• "Declinations aren't really a big deal anymore to us because we know what the case is, and if the federal government declines we've already had a chance to prosecute that case too," Walker said. "So it's not like the ball is hidden, and the prosecution's office doesn't know about it."
• Purdon cited a drug trafficking case on the Standing Rock Reservation dubbed "Operation Prairie Thunder," in which 12 people were indicted in federal court and five in tribal court. Purdon said that while the tribal cases were subtracted from their prosecution record, it showed unprecedented cooperation and could lead to long-

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