Rep. Debra Lekanoff (D-Bow) said she was speaking as a Native woman rather than as a legislator as she told the state Senate Law and Justice Committee about the importance of HB 1829 earlier in the 2025 legislative session.
“If I’m a Swinomish tribal member, for example, and I have been violated on the reservation and the perpetrator — regardless of who they are — has left the reservation, my justice has been lost,” said Lekanoff, who is Tlingit and one of three Native legislators in Washington. “The State of Washington does not recognize tribal warrants, and the perpetrator who harmed me or my daughter cannot be brought back to the reservation to (face) justice in a court system that models the court system of the United States and of Washington state.”
HB 1829 changes that. The bill — approved unanimously by the state Senate on April 9 and near-unanimously by the state House on April 18 — would empower nontribal law enforcement officers to arrest any individual for whom a tribal court has issued a warrant and take the individual to Superior Court for return to tribal jurisdiction. It’s akin to extradition from one jurisdiction to another — from, say, one state or one county to another.
Fugitives from the tribal justice system and those breaking terms of bail, probation or parole could also be charged with a crime by the state.
HB 1829 was signed by Gov. Bob Ferguson on May 14. Lekanoff co-sponsored the bill with Roger Goodman (D-Kirkland) and Gerry Pollett (D-North Seattle).
“You are going to bring justice to the people whose homelands you call home, whose justice systems have been created based on what you have all been trained on,” Lekanoff told the Senate Law and Justice Committee on March 24. “You’re going to bring justice to the people who look like me and sound like me. After many years of promise and partnership, I believe this is one of the greatest accomplishments Washington state can bring forward.”
HB 1829 follows passage of the Tribal Warrants Act, unanimously passed by the Legislature last year, which grants a warrant issued by a tribal court the “full faith and credit by the courts of the state of Washington” to be enforced by the state “as if it were the arrest warrant of the state.” The Tribal Warrants Act takes effect on July 1 this year; HB 1829 is the result of a governor’s task force that developed processes to ensure the act’s successful implementation.
Through the Tribal Warrants Act, “the Legislature recognized that tribes have, for decades, agreed by treaty and through practice not to shelter or conceal individuals who violate Washington state law, but rather to surrender these individuals to the state for prosecution,” a task force report stated. “The (Tribal Warrants Act) seeks to create uniform processes by which the state may reciprocate by consistently returning (to tribal authorities) those individuals who violate tribal law and seek to avoid tribal justice systems by leaving tribal jurisdiction.”
The legislation has broad support among law enforcement. James McMahon, policy director with the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs, said his association participated in the legislation’s development and said, “It is something that, frankly, we need to do.”
Swinomish Police Chief Earl Cowan III said suspects evading justice by staying off reservation has been an issue during his 16 years with the department.
“We had some tribal housing just off reservation and a suspect could be living in that tribal housing with somebody, but because they were outside the reservation’s boundary, we could not serve our tribal court process on them,” Cowan said. “I’m not saying they would taunt us, but they knew if they could get across the magic line, they’d be free and clear — ‘You’ve got to stop right there at that line. You can’t get me over here’.”
Currently, Swinomish Police are pursuing a case of a nontribal perpetrator of domestic violence on a trial member, he said. The perpetrator fled the scene and has been in King County, avoiding the reservation.
“Now, the tribe has the ability to hold those offenders accountable in tribal court, which is a big component of our sovereignty,” Cowan said. “You come here and commit a crime in Swinomish, the community should have the ability to be able to hold you accountable.”
‘Boundaries should not allow a person to evade justice’
Twenty-nine tribal nations share geography with Washington. The tribes and the state are sovereigns, with tribes having jurisdiction over Native Americans and the state and its cities and counties having jurisdiction over non-Natives.
The tribal nations have their own courts or are part of the Northwest Intertribal Court System. Tribal courts can impose sentences of up to three years imprisonment and/or a $15,000 fine per offense, with a combined maximum of nine years for multiple offenses in a single proceeding. Offenders usually serve their sentences at Colville Tribal Correctional Facility in Nespelem, Nisqually Corrections Facility in Olympia or Yakama Nation Correctional and Rehabilitation Facility in Toppenish. Crimes warranting longer sentences are prosecuted in U.S. District Court, with sentences served in state or federal prison.
But shared geography has often resulted in jurisdictional conflicts.
In a 1978 case stemming from Suquamish Police arrest of two non-Indians — one for assaulting a tribal police officer, another for reckless endangerment — the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that tribal courts do not have criminal jurisdiction over non-Natives. Thirty-five years later, however, Congress granted tribes criminal jurisdiction over certain offenses committed by non-Indians in Indian Country — domestic violence, dating violence and protection order violations — and later expanded it to include violence against tribal police and other justice personnel.
In 2005, a non-Native woman suspected of drunken driving attempted to evade Lummi Nation police, leading them on a pursuit that continued outside reservation boundaries where tribal police finally arrested her. She challenged her arrest, arguing that tribal police had no authority to pursue fleeing suspects off reservation. The state Supreme Court sided with tribal police.
And in 2010, the Swinomish Police Department became the first tribal police department in Washington to become accredited by the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs. That means Swinomish police can enforce state as well as tribal laws.
HB 1829 fills another jurisdictional gap by giving statewide standing to warrants issued by tribal courts. As it currently stands, an individual suspected or convicted of committing a crime on tribal lands can evade justice by remaining off-reservation. If signed by Ferguson, that ends.
A tribal court would file a warrant with a superior court, and the Superior Court would then issue an arrest warrant to local police. The suspect, once apprehended, would appear in local court the next judicial day and the court would hold an extradition hearing within 72 hours. Tribal prosecutors would have standing in any hearing. A tribal court warrant filed in superior court would expire six months after issuance unless withdrawn earlier.
Joe McKittrick, staff counsel for the Senate Law and Justice Committee, said a fugitive or suspect would have the same protections against unlawful detention — aka the right of habeas corpus — as are provided in the state justice system. A law enforcement officer, local corrections officer or jail may not be held criminally or civilly liable for making an arrest or not making an arrest if the officer or the officer’s legal adviser “acted in good faith and without malice,” the bill states.
McMahon told the committee on March 24 that he expects HB 1829 to be amended in the future and that training for law enforcement and courts will be required, but that the bill as it stands is necessary.
“The boundaries of a tribal jurisdiction should not allow a person to evade justice,” he said. “We think that passage of this bill is necessary to make (the Tribal Warrants Act) implementable and actually workable in the real world when it becomes effective later this year.”
The Tribal Warrants Act takes effect at an opportune time for the Samish Nation, whose land base consists of some 200 noncontiguous acres spread out over Fidalgo and Lopez islands. Samish doesn’t have a police department; it pays neighboring jurisdictions for that service. And Samish relies on the Northwest Intertribal Court System for administration of justice.
Samish Nation Chairman Tom Wooten said Samish has hired its first police officer, who will attend a federal training academy in June. The officer will be a Conservation Law Enforcement Officer primarily responsible for the enforcement of natural resource regulations on Samish’s lands. However, such officers may also respond to nonresource related violations — the Supreme Court ruled in 2021 that tribal police officers have the authority to search and temporarily detain non-Indians suspected of breaking federal or state laws on tribal lands. So, the Tribal Warrants Act will be an important tool, Wooten said.
“We’re checkerboarded, just like a lot of the tribes in the Northwest,” Wooten said. “Going forward, the Tribal Warrants Act makes perfect sense for us because we’re so integrated within the broader community.”
A suspect would not be able to evade justice by simply staying off of Samish lands. The tribe’s attorney would ask a judge of the Northwest Intertribal Court System for a warrant, which would be filed with a state court. The suspect could then be picked up by any law enforcement officer of the state and returned to court.
“This law would enable us to have that ability,” Wooten said, “and that’s important. We’re part of the broader community and we have responsibilities, just like the city and the county have, to keep people safe.”
Cowan said, “It’s definitely a win for Indian Country and criminal justice across the state, because those offenders that are out in those communities, they’re committing those crimes there too. It expands the ability to keep everybody safe.”
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