Cabrera and Dawn Bitz-Running Wolf, an assistant U.S. attorney in the Great Falls office, were sworn in last month. Chief U.S. District Judge Richard Cebull administered their oaths.
Cabrera is the sister of Senate legal counsel Tony Cabrera and the daughter of former Democratic Party Chairman Larry Cabrera.
She has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Hawaii and was a kindergarten teacher in the state.
She earned her law degree from the University of New Mexico School of Law with a certificate in indian law.
She has been working as a state prosecutor for the Crow Tribe for two years before she moved to the federal government.
According to Billings Gazette, Diane Cabrera will have the authority to seek grand jury charges for federal cases in the Crow Indian Reservation, the largest of the seven reservations in the state.
Montana media quoted U.S. Attorney Bill Mercer as saying that the addition of the two Indian law experts will expand prosecutions from the state’s Indian reservations and protect the rights of Native Americans.
Mercer said Cabrera’s position as a special assistant prosecutor is new and believes that she is the first tribal prosecutor nationally to become a special assistant.
He explained that in crimes where the offender is non-Indian and the victim is Indian, only the federal government has jurisdiction.
The tribe has no jurisdiction over non-Indians and the state has no jurisdiction on reservations and the federal court is the only place where things can be adjudicated in such instances.
