‘Career criminal’ believes he deserves a second chance

WINDOW ROCK

Jerome Yazzie dreams of one day being able to return home to the Navajo Reservation before he becomes a senior citizen.

But he is currently sitting in a federal prison facing another 35 years before he will be eligible for parole. And he thinks that is unfair.

According to Navajo police records, Yazzie, 40, in June of 2011 had forced his 15-year-old daughter and her 18-year-old boyfriend to accompany him while he engaged in a crime spree that lasted several hours in the small community of Tohajiilee, New Mexico.

The spree included burglarizing two residences at gunpoint, committing a robbery, kidnapping a young man, and discharging his firearm.

According to witnesses, Yazzie, who was armed with a loaded shotgun, went to the first residence, which was occupied by a teenager and a young man, and kicked open the door.

He burst into the residence and discharged his shotgun, ordering his daughter and her boyfriend to restrain the residents while he robbed them and burglarized the home.

Yazzie, according to police records, then continued to the second house, which was occupied by a young married couple and their four-month-old infant. Police said Yazzie knew that the couple would not voluntarily let him into their house because he had tried to do that earlier in the day and was not successful.

So what he did was use the man from the first house in an attempt to lure the second couple into opening their door. So he took off the young man’s restraints and pointed him to the door of the young couple’s home and told him he had to convince them to open the door.

But the young couple knew something was wrong and refused to open the door so Yazzie, according to police, put the restraints back on the man from the first house and took him back to his house.

All of this, however, gave the young couple in the second house time to take their infant and flee.

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