Crownpoint man gets 42-month sentence after assaulting Navajo officer

A Crownpoint man who attacked a woman, then fought a Navajo Nation Police Department officer and used the officer’s taser against him, was sentenced to 42 months in federal prison on June 11. Jason K. Thompson, an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation, will also serve three years of supervised release after prison. Federal prosecutors said there is no parole in the federal system.

The case began as a domestic-violence call on March 18, 2025. Prosecutors said Thompson tried to strangle a woman, prompting two Navajo Nation Police Department officers to respond. According to the federal complaint filed in the case, Thompson was already in handcuffs when officers arrived, but he escaped while still restrained. When officers tried to take him back into custody, he struggled with one officer, grabbed a department-issued taser and fired it into the officer’s chest with the intent to injure.

Thompson was handcuffed again and placed in the back of a Navajo Nation Police Department patrol unit, but prosecutors said he escaped a second time. The complaint said he removed rear window bars, kicked out the patrol-unit window and got out of the vehicle before being recaptured later that night by Navajo Nation Police. The complaint identified Thompson as 39 at the time of the March 2025 charges.

Thompson later pleaded guilty on March 13, 2026, to assault by strangulation and assault with a deadly weapon. At the time of the plea announcement, prosecutors said he faced up to 10 years in prison. The sentence was imposed June 11, 2026.

The FBI’s Gallup Resident Agency investigated the case with help from the Navajo Police Department and the Navajo Department of Criminal Investigations. Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark A. Probasco prosecuted the case, and the plea and sentencing were publicly announced by First Assistant U.S. Attorney Ryan Ellison and FBI Albuquerque Field Office Special Agent in Charge Justin A. Garris. For McKinley County, the case shows how a domestic-violence emergency in Crownpoint escalated into an assault on a tribal officer and a federal prison term that will keep Thompson incarcerated for years.