Ernest Larry Tabaha

Introduction

Ernest Larry Tabaha, 65, of Fort Defiance, Arizona, an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation, was sentenced in June 2026 by U.S. District Judge Steven P. Logan to 87 months in prison, followed by 180 months of supervised release, for sexually abusing a teenager on the Navajo Nation . Tabaha pleaded guilty before sentencing, resolving the case as a conviction by his own admission. The offense, per the announcement by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Arizona, occurred in 2024: Tabaha provided alcohol to a teenaged girl until she became highly intoxicated and passed out, and then engaged in a sexual act with the victim while she was unconscious .

Background Information

The case was investigated by the FBI Phoenix Division’s Flagstaff office together with the Navajo Nation Division of Public Safety, the two agencies that police major crimes in the jurisdiction covering Fort Defiance and the surrounding reservation land . The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Arizona handled the prosecution. The conduct to which Tabaha pleaded guilty — intoxicating a teenager with alcohol and abusing her while she was unconscious — placed the case within the federal Indian Country jurisdiction that governs sexual abuse offenses committed on the Navajo Nation, and the release was published under the department’s Indian Country Law and Justice topic .

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation

Convicted and sentenced. Tabaha pleaded guilty to sexually abusing a teenager on the Navajo Nation after providing her alcohol until she passed out, and received 87 months in prison plus 15 years of supervised release.

In 2024, Tabaha provided alcohol to a teenaged girl until she became highly intoxicated and passed out. He then engaged in a sexual act with the victim while she was unconscious — the conduct to which he pleaded guilty in federal court . The victim was a teenager; the location was the Navajo Nation, where the federal government holds criminal jurisdiction over major crimes and where the FBI and the Navajo Nation Division of Public Safety jointly worked the investigation. At 65 years old, Tabaha was more than four decades older than the child he admitted abusing.

The plea carried the conviction, and Judge Steven P. Logan sentenced him to 87 months — more than seven years — in federal prison, followed by 180 months of supervised release, a term that will keep Tabaha under federal court supervision for fifteen years after he completes the custodial sentence .

Public Reaction and Consequences

The U.S. Attorney’s Office announced the sentence in a release dated June 24, 2026, recording the plea conviction and the sentence but no public statement from Tabaha and no victim statement in the public record . The consequences are entirely custodial and supervisory: a 65-year-old man entering federal prison for more than seven years, with the 180-month supervised release term running well past his 70s upon release. The prosecution sits within the federal government’s Indian Country enforcement program, which the Justice Department publicizes under its Indian Country Law and Justice topic, and the case adds to the recorded federal response to sexual abuse of children on the Navajo Nation .

Current Status

Tabaha stands convicted following his guilty plea and is serving an 87-month prison sentence followed by 180 months of supervised release, imposed by Judge Steven P. Logan . The case number is CR-25-8028-PCT-SPL in the District of Arizona, under release number 2026-106_Tabaha. The release records no appeal and no pending additional counts, so the sentence stands as the final public disposition as of this writing. His age means the supervised release term — fifteen years — will govern a substantial remainder of his life after custody .

Impact on Their Career/Life

At 65, Tabaha’s seven-year federal prison sentence consumes his mid-70s, and the fifteen years of supervised release that follow will keep him registered under federal court supervision and subject to its conditions for what remains of his adult life . A federal felony conviction for sexually abusing a teenager ends any standing he held in his community of Fort Defiance, and the conviction record — intoxicating a child and abusing her while she was unconscious — is permanent. The case documents, once more, the pattern the FBI’s Flagstaff office and the Navajo Nation Division of Public Safety exist to answer: sexual abuse of children on the Nation, prosecuted federally when the evidence supports it .

Sources

• DOJ press release, “Fort Defiance Man Sentenced to More Than 7 Years in Prison for Sexually Abusing Teenager,” U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Arizona, June 24, 2026 source