For several decades, efforts to address the epidemic of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and People have faced complex jurisdictional gaps and a documented lack of coordination among federal, state, and provincial legal systems.

Existing colonial frameworks, primarily rooted in the Indian Act, have historically restricted First Nations, Inuit, and Métis communities from exercising comprehensive criminal jurisdiction over non-Indigenous offenders who commit crimes on their traditional territories and reserves.

In response, Indigenous Nations and legal advocates are actively developing custom Land Codes, pursuing self-administered policing agreements, and asserting inherent treaty rights designed to expand their local law enforcement authority, protect their communities, and enforce their sovereign jurisdiction.