The Justice Department said Oct. 20 that Operation Not Forgotten supported 548 case investigations in Indian country between April 1 and Sept. 30, up 59% from 2025. The surge produced 118 arrests and 41 people charged federally, according to the department’s results announcement.
What Operation Not Forgotten Produced in 2026
The Justice Department describes the operation as a federal surge of personnel and investigative resources aimed at unresolved cases in Indian country, with priority for violence against women and children, including missing and murdered persons. This was its fourth year. Twelve FBI field offices hosted surge personnel on rotating temporary duty: Albuquerque, Billings, Detroit, Denver, Jackson, Las Vegas, Minneapolis, Oklahoma City, Omaha, Portland, Phoenix and Salt Lake City.
The department listed these results: 548 case investigations supported, 118 arrests, up 123%, and 41 people charged federally, up 52%. Investigators identified or located 25 child victims, recovered 72 weapons, conducted 990 interviews and ran 232 search operations. The FBI Director, Kash Patel, said the bureau “worked more than 500 cases” during the surge.
Attorney General Todd Blanche said the department will keep working to deliver justice for victims of violent crime in Indian country. Billy Kirkland, the assistant secretary for Indian affairs at the Interior Department, said the surge reflects the administration’s commitment to protecting tribal communities and giving families answers.
How the 2026 Results Compare with 2025
The department’s 2025 announcement said the earlier surge used 64 FBI personnel and 36 personnel from the Bureau of Indian Affairs Missing and Murdered Unit across 10 field offices and supported more than 330 investigations. The 2026 surge used 12 field offices.
The percentage increases in the 2026 announcement imply the earlier totals. A 59% rise to 548 puts the 2025 count near 345, which is consistent with the “more than 330” the department reported then. A 123% rise to 118 arrests implies about 53 arrests last year, and a 52% rise to 41 charged implies about 27. These figures are calculations from the percentages, and the 2025 announcement did not publish arrest or charging totals for the surge itself.
The 2025 announcement also gave a cumulative count for the three deployments to that point: support for more than 760 cases, 249 arrests, 235 subjects charged and 109 convictions. Adding the 2026 totals gives more than 1,300 cases supported and at least 367 arrests across four years. That sum is a calculation, and the department has not published a four-year total.
Rewards under Operation Steadfast Promise
The announcement describes Operation Steadfast Promise as a broader FBI surge launched in 2026 that adds initiatives to the operation’s work on violent threats in Indian country. Since April, it said, the FBI opened more than 1,200 new investigations in Indian country under the effort, charged 678 subjects, made more than 700 arrests, recovered 2,260 weapons and made 140 drug seizures.
Patel said the FBI has about 400 agents dedicated to Indian country and 30 Safe Trails Task Forces. In August, the FBI set a minimum reward of up to $25,000 for publicly advertised homicide, kidnapping and missing-persons cases in Indian country where the bureau has taken jurisdiction. Patel said the bureau quadrupled the rewards for certain cases. The department also pointed to Voices Not Forgotten, an FBI program with an interactive map of Indian country investigations where the public’s help is sought.
Cases the Surge Reached
The department highlighted cases in five districts. In Wyoming, it said the surge contributed to federal indictments of 18 people for violent crimes and child abuse on the Wind River Indian Reservation. One is Jose Benito Ocon, charged in a five-count indictment with first-degree murder and assault with a dangerous weapon over an August 2025 shooting near Riverton. A conviction on the murder count carries a mandatory life sentence.
In Nevada, a July superseding indictment charged Delshay Astor with the February 2022 murder of Anna Scott, a member of the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe, on the Reno-Sparks Indian Colony. Joel Christy faces a charge of helping Astor avoid arrest. In Montana, Michael Plentybuffalo was charged in the death of Shann Nomee, who went missing during an extreme cold snap in January 2024. Her frozen body was found in a field north of Lodge Grass after a community-led search and a tip to the Bureau of Indian Affairs. That case awaits trial.
Minnesota charged four cases during the surge period, and Arizona charged at least four cases on the Navajo Nation plus an assault on the Fort Apache Indian Reservation. The charges are allegations, and the defendants are presumed innocent. The department’s announcement does not report pleas or verdicts for the cases it highlighted.
Why Violence in Indian Country Draws Federal Attention
The scale of the problem predates the surge. A National Institute of Justice report by André B. Rosay, published in 2016 from 2010 survey data, found that 84.3% of American Indian and Alaska Native women had experienced violence in their lifetimes, including 56.1% who had experienced sexual violence. For men the figures were 81.6% and 27.5%. Among women who experienced violence, 97% reported at least one perpetrator who was not American Indian or Alaska Native.
Those figures are more than a decade old and come from a single national survey, but they remain the institute’s published baseline on the subject. The department’s 2025 announcement put the caseload at the start of fiscal 2025 at about 4,300 open investigations, and the 2026 announcement says the operation continued to work more than 4,000 open Indian country investigations.
