93% conviction rate among 2023 accomplishments for North Dakota office, US Attorney Mac Schneider says

Feb. 17—GRAND FORKS — As U.S. attorney for the District of North Dakota, Mac Schneider says he's proud to be part of what he considers an accomplished, dedicated team.

"I see how passionate they are about justice," Schneider said. "I see how hard they work. It is an absolute inspiration to be able to work with them every day."

Schneider, who in December completed his first full year as U.S. attorney for North Dakota, recently visited with the Grand Forks Herald's editorial board, outlining what he considers the successes of his first year on the job.

In 2023, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of North Dakota achieved a 93.3% conviction rate. The national average, according to Department of Justice statistics, is 92.5%. Also, of the District of North Dakota cases that were appealed, 96% (27 of 28) were ruled in favor of the U.S.

A handout provided by Schneider showed that the North Dakota U.S. Attorney's Office "was number one among small districts in defendents per (assistant U.S. attorney) and number four out of 94 districts nationally."

With the largest caseload of all small districts, six more assistant U.S. attorneys have been hired in North Dakota since Schneider was sworn in, bringing the total to 27. Two have been designated to Native American reservations. They intimately know the communities with which they work, Schneider said.

"That's really a game-changer for our office," he said.

The goal of these assistant attorneys is to approach public safety from a whole government perspective, Schneider said. Rather than sitting in the U.S. Attorney's Office waiting for cases, attorneys are out making connections with the communities they serve.

"They are there — working with community leaders, working to keep kids safe, working to protect vulnerable adults," Schneider said. "(They're) really going above and beyond in terms of trying to increase public safety and trying to avoid prosecutions, if we at all could, by preventing violent crime in the first place."

Making connections is a priority for the USAO-ND. Being a strong and reliable federal partner is perhaps its most important responsibility and, thankfully, connecting with agencies statewide has been a breeze, Schneider said.

"It was really a pleasant surprise to me to see how quick our law enforcement community is to partner, (and) how closely they work together," he said. "There are different uniforms and different office buildings, but there's really one team, and that's team 'public safety in North Dakota.'"

The USAO-ND recently released a 2023 community report to highlight its efforts throughout the year, some of which include prosecuting violent criminals, drug and human traffickers and child predators.

Being a border district, prosecuting immigration violations is a priority for the USAO-ND, said Schneider, who believes that with rising concerns about smugglers, it's important to establish that the northern border is not a soft target.

Two cases that were prosecuted in 2023 — U.S. v. Arzola-Carillo and U.S. v. De Dios-Carillo — involve defendants who were sentenced to between 18 and 24 months in federal prison. Some will be deported as a result of their convictions.

Both cases involved smuggling operations that took place during the winter. An already risky endeavor, crossing the northern border during the cold months is particularly dangerous, Schneider said.

"(Smugglers) endanger lives when they try to sneak people into our country," he said.

Many migrants don't know what they're getting into, which is evident in these cases because the groups ultimately contacted law enforcement after running into weather-related obstacles.

Crimes against children — specifically the possession and distribution of sexually abusive images and videos — appear to be a growing issue. In 2022, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children received more than 32 million cyber tips, compared to 29 million in 2021 and 21 million in 2020.

"That was astonishing to me — just the volume of child sexual abuse material out there," Schneider said. "That's a horrifying amount."

In 2023, two child sex offenders were sentenced to decades in federal prison for both possessing child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and sexually abusing one of the children depicted in the images or videos.

"It's all too common that someone who is downloading child sex abuse material is also a hands-on offender," Schneider said. "It's disturbingly common."

Hands-on or not, viewing, downloading and sharing CSAM is never a victimless crime, he said.

"That's material on the internet of real kids who are victimized," Schneider said. "Anytime that's viewed by someone, they're re-victimized. It is really a heinous crime."

Though he suspects the problem is growing, Schneider said he and his team are dedicated to relentlessly prosecuting offenders and, hopefully, deterring others from committing the same crimes.

"When a child is rescued from a situation where they're experiencing abuse, that goes beyond getting a strong sentence," Schneider said. "You're keeping someone safe, and our prosecutors who deal with child exploitation and child sex abuse, they've done that. They intervene and protect kids in real time, and that's very rewarding for them."

Schneider believes notable progress has been made to address violent crime in North Dakota. Fargo has a new gun crime intelligence center, which means law enforcement will have access to a machine that forensically examines shell casings to determine the "fingerprint" of the gun they came from.

The information is then shared on a nationwide database, allowing law enforcement to track organizers of violent crime.

"It's amazing how a few individuals can drive a lot of violent crime," Schneider.

With this new resource, crimes can be solved not just in Fargo, but also state- and nationwide.

Also in Fargo, a Department of Justice attorney will be assigned to work on violent crime in the area. Schneider hopes this will allow the USAO-ND to further target violent crime organizers before they can reoffend.

"We don't want to just be pulling folks out of the river," Schneider. "We want to go upstream and see who's throwing them in."