NCJ Number
111916
Journal
Practicing Anthropology Volume: 7 Issue: 3 Dated: (1985) Pages: 15-16
Date Published
1985
Length
2 pages
Annotation
During 1974-1976, the Pima County Sheriff's Department (Arizona) conducted a team policing project in the Yaqui community of New Pascua.
Abstract
The project was undertaken at the request of the Pascua Yaqui Association (PYA), the governing body of the community, which had requested additional patrols in the hopes of reducing crime. Two deputies, an Anglo and a Yaqui, were assigned to the project. The project ultimately failed as a result of several factors. There was a consistent misperception of the Yaqui identity as that of American Indian, when in fact, the Yaqui experience is different and the laws regarding Indians did not apply to them. In addition, the PYA contended that they had been promised a police substation, and failure to build the substation contributed to a loss of community support in the project. Further, as the two deputies adopted Yaqui legal and moral values associated with the compadre system of obligations and responsibilities to elicit greater support from the residents, this nontraditional approach was viewed with distrust and hostility by administrators and other officers in the sheriff's department. Changing police and Yaqui perceptions of the project, changes in PYA and sheriff's department personnel, and a lack of explicit and mutually agreed upon goals of community involvement doomed the program and led to its demise in early 1977.