Berating hate
Navajo officials, Grants PD meet about hate crimes

Grants chief of police Steve Sena, assures community outreach volunteers and members of the Navajo Human Rights Commission on the efforts of Grants police investigating the beatings of Navajo transient men in the area. — © 2009 Gallup Independent / Adron Gardner

Copyright © 2009
Gallup Independent
By Jim Tiffin
Cibola County Bureau

GRANTS — In an historic, first-ever meeting Wednesday between Navajo Nation officials, including Vice President Ben Shelly, and Grants Police, both sides expressed a sincere desire to find those responsible for the beatings of several Navajo men in Grants, and to begin some sort of public education effort about race relations.

In his remarks to Grants Police Chief Steve Sena, Lt. Maxine Spidle, Detective Sgt. John Castaneda and Detective Kevin Dobbs, Shelly said the beatings are reminders of the historical racial intolerance his Navajo forefathers faced during the early parts of what he termed “New Mexico’s dark history.”

“I want to think that times are different now but these beatings are stark reminders of the past,” he said. “From the Navajo Nation, we do not take these matters lightly.”

Navajo Nation Human Rights Commission Executive Director Leonard Gorman; the commission’s attorney, Donovan Brown; and Lt. Tulley Jim, assistant chief of police for the Navajo Nation, were also in attendance.

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