Valerie Taliman: Stalking is a critical issue for Indian Country

Friday, May 6, 2011  

"For days after their emotional breakup, Sharla’s ex-boyfriend called her more than 50 times a day, pleading with her to take him back. She avoided his calls, but that further agitated him, and he eventually came looking for her. In the next two months, he rammed his car into hers, then pulled her from the wrecked car to say their breakup was driving him crazy. He showed up drunk and belligerent at pow wows and private parties Sharla was at, “like a monster out of the dark,” she says, yelling and making threats while friends tried to shield her.

Terrified by his erratic behavior, Sharla quit college and took refuge five states away, at what she thought was the safest place in the world—her parents’ home. Weeks passed, and things seem to stabilize as she pondered a new life, but the first weekend her parents were out of town, Sharla awoke in the middle of the night to find her former boyfriend standing over her in the dark—and this time there was no one to help her.

Sadly, Sharla is not alone. American Indian women in the United States are stalked at double the rates experienced by white women, according to several studies. One in every 12 women have been stalked in their lifetimes, and 31 percent of those women have been sexually assaulted by their stalker, according to the 1998 Department of Justice report “Stalking in America: Findings From the National Violence Against Women Survey.”

Native women reported the highest rates of stalking, with at least 17 percent reporting that they were stalked in their lifetimes, compared to 8.2 percent of white women, 6.5 percent of African American women, and 4.5 percent of Asian–Pacific Islander women, the report said."

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Valerie Taliman: Why Stalking Is a Critical Issue in Indian Country (Indian Country Today 5/2)