HELENA, Mont. (AP) — Montana’s Department of Justice has hired two people to oversee efforts to better report and track missing persons cases

Attorney General Tim Fox announced Monday that former Glacier County Deputy Sheriff Misty LaPlant is the agency’s new missing person’s specialist. She is a member of the Blackfeet Tribe and was a police officer on the reservation.

Tina Chamberlain of Helena is coordinator of the Looping In Native Communities, or LINC, grant program. She is a former grants coordinator with the Montana Bureau of Crime Control.

Lawmakers created both positions along with the Missing Indigenous Persons Task Force, which is working to identify barriers to local, state, federal and tribal agencies working together on missing persons cases.

The task force will award grants to tribal colleges to better track missing Native Americans.

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