Yesterday when I was driving home from visiting my mom, I was listening to an intriguing and disturbing story on NPR.

It turns out that Native American women who are rape victims on reservations cannot press charges against their attacker if the attacker is a visitor to the reservation.* This was shocking to me.  The piece was actually a follow up on a story they did  a year ago.

Disturbing information from the article:

• One in three Native American women will be raped in her lifetime.
• A 2004 study conducted by the department found that the number of suspects investigated by U.S. attorneys for crimes on Indian land declined 21 percent from 1997 to 2000.
• There aren’t enough police to investigate sexual assaults, and few of the cases are prosecuted.

My first thought is disgust for these women and my second thought is what can I do to raise awareness over the perpetual invisibleness of these crimes…

* I haven’t found this written anywhere but heard it on the radio show.