Sheriff candidates face questions about jurisdiction, accountability in Shiprock forum

Four Republican candidates for San Juan County sheriff faced a Shiprock audience with a question that has shadowed the office for decades: how can the county’s top law-enforcement officer serve Navajo voters in places where the sheriff has no primary criminal authority?

Jonathan M. Nyce, Daniel Webb, Kevin Burns and Kenneth W. Christesen appeared at a forum hosted by the Northern Agency Veterans Organization, a group established in 2019 to serve Diné veterans in the Northern Navajo Agency. The setting underscored the stakes. Shiprock sits inside a county where 64.8% of the land is tribal, including 61.9% Navajo Nation land and 2.9% Ute Mountain Ute Tribal land, while only 6% is privately owned.

Vice President Richelle Montoya said afterward that she did not hear the answer she had come for. “I did not hear anything about how they are going to be accountable,” she said. Her criticism reflected the practical concern that drives public-safety debates in western San Juan County: residents want to know who patrols, who responds and who is responsible when a call falls into a jurisdictional gap.

San Juan County says the county covers 5,538 square miles and had 121,661 residents in the 2020 Census. It also says 41.6% of residents identify as American Indian and Alaska Native alone, a reminder that tribal communities are not a side note in county government but a central part of it. In places like Shiprock, the county sheriff is expected to matter even when the legal map is split between county and tribal authority.

That split has pushed cooperation onto the agenda again. The Navajo Nation Legislative Branch reviewed a Feb. 24, 2026, mutual aid agreement involving the Navajo Nation Division of Public Safety, the Navajo Police Department and the San Juan County Sheriff’s Office. The agreement was intended to support cooperative law-enforcement operations and voluntary mutual aid during disasters or emergencies within each party’s jurisdiction.

The jurisdiction fight is also old. A 1994 Deseret News report said San Juan County and Navajo leaders had already signed a shared law-enforcement jurisdiction agreement on the Utah side after a cross-deputization agreement expired in 1990. The recurring theme is the same: when police authority is divided, response times, staffing and accountability are never just campaign talking points.

All four Republican candidates were on the ballot for the June 2 primary, and Shiprock voters were left weighing which candidate could explain not only how the sheriff’s office would reach Diné communities, but how it would answer for what happens when it cannot.