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INDIAN NEWS AND ISSUES
INDIAN NEWS AND ISSUES
Welcome and please feel free to post any news and events in your area
THE NATIVE AMERICAN ADVOCATE
News and Issues -- Anonymous, 09:29:03 03/12/01 Mon

Advocate Reporter (no email / no homepage) wrote:

> > Hi Joanne ,
> > The protests are going on daily still ..
> > The protests are making some at Table Mountain uncomfortable so I think it
is imperitive that they continue and also that the heat gets a little hotter We need help and support in my neck of the woods....Could you please distribute this to your readers :)
> > We need Indian and Non Indian to respond to us and offer support for our cause.
> > Please read the Statement below and any and all who wish to help with the
> > peaceful protest to support and help this coalition please contact
> > PonieGirl8@aol.com by email or send letters by
> snail mail to
> > Table Mountain Casino
> > 23736 Sky Harbor Road
> > Friant , CA
> > or PHONE 559 822 2587
> > I have always felt that telegrams are also effective ... any way you choose please support the people of this coalition ! Table Mountain Casino and Rancheria chooses Genocide of their own people over doing the right thing !
> > This is an urgent action !!!!
> > Thanks in advance and read the notice below
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
> >
> TRIBAL WAR
> > STOP ; DO NOT SUPPORT THIS CASINO
> >
> > TABLE MOUNTAIN RANCHERIA STILL REFUSES THEIR PEOPLE!!!!!!
> >
> > OVER 20 YEARS AGO ( LONG BEFORE THIS CASINO) THE TRIBE SUED THE U.S. GOVERNMENT AND WON. THE GOVERNMENT ORDERED THEM TO RE ORGANIZE AND NOTIFY ALL THEIR PEOPLE OF THEIR STATUS AS INDIANS. TABLE MOUNTAIN IGNORED THIS ORDER, THIS IS WHEN OUR FIGHT BEGAN.
> >
> > IN AUGUST OF LAST YEAR WE BEGAN A MARCH ON THE TRIBAL BUILDING , THE COUNCIL STOPPED US AND WANTED TO TALK THINGS OUT
.....FINALLY !!!
> > LEANNE WALKER GRANT, TRIBAL CHAIR, AND THE COUNCIL, ADMITTED THEY HAD MADE A MISTAKE AND THEY WOULD DO EVERYTHING TO MAKE
THINGS RIGHT. THEY LIED , THEY ARE DOING EVERYTHING TO KEEP US OUT.
> >
> > THEY TOLD US TO PROVIDE THEM WITH PAPERS PROVING WHO WE ARE EVEN THOUGH MANY OF US GREW UP WITH THEM HERE AND ARE THEIR COUSINS NIECES AND NEPHEWS.....THIS WE DID .
> >
> > THEY WANT MANY OF US TO PROVIDE THEM WITH DNA EVEN THOUGH OUR BLOOD FLOWS THROUGH THEIR VEINS AND WE ARE ALL THE CHILDREN OF THE ANCESTORS THAT ARE BURIED HERE AT TABLE MOUNTAIN.
> >
> > THEY BROUGHT IN A HANDFUL OF US TO SEPARATE US AND MAKE THE COALITION WEAKER IN NUMBERS....TO DIVIDE OUR FAMILIES ....TO WEAKEN
OUR HEARTS ....THEY FAILED
> >
> > THE TRIBAL COUNCILS ACTIONS ARE CRIMINAL AND THEY MUST BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE AS TRIBAL LEADERS THEY HAVE STOLEN FROM US OUR STATUS AS INDIAN PEOPLE .....OUR MEDICAL ... OUR EDUCATIONAL BENEFITS.
> >
> > MORE THAN THIS THEY HAVE STOLEN OUR HERITAGE AND HAVE BROKEN THE SACRED CIRCLE OF OUR TRIBE!
> >
> > WE WILL NOT STOP THIS ACTION UNTIL EVERYONE OF US IS RECOGNISED !
> >
> > JOIN OUR FIGHT , CALL THEM, OR WRITE THEM.....STAND WITH US !
> >
> > DO NOT SUPPORT THIS CASINO ......THANK YOU !
<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>

37 Date: 2001-02-10 04:51:25
Advocate Reporter (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Subject: [Native-American-Advocate] Position Announcement


Greetings!

Please Post the following attached Job Announcements. We are currently
Accepting applications and interviewing for three Job Positions: (1)
Youth/Teen Programs Coordinator (2) Chief Financial Officer/Human Resources

(3) Foster Care Social Worker.

Positions are open until Filled. We would like to hire immediately. PLEASE CONTACT CHRISTINA FOR ATTACHMENTS> COMPLETE DESCRIPTIONS>
Agency Info:
Indigenous Nations Child and Family Agency (INCFA) is an Indian-managed, Oakland-based 501(c) 3 non-profit, incorporated as the Bay Area American Indian Council. INCFA's overall goals are to restore and strengthen the family circle through comprehensive, culturally based services that promote family stability and wellness. INCFA is a licensed foster care agency that provides advocacy and placement pursuant to the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA); child abuse and domestic/family violence prevention programs; counseling services; and parenting/ family reunification support. INCFA also provides services and case management for Unity Village, a transitional housing program for formerly homeless Native Americans. Unity Village units serve four target populations: (1) domestic violence survivors; (2) adults in
drug/alcohol recovery; (3) veterans' families; and (4) family unification housing.

Please mail, fax, or e-mail your resume with cover letter and two
references to the address listed below:
ATT: Cristina RodrÌguez de La Mar, INCFA Executive Director
INDIGENOUS NATIONS CHILD & FAMILY AGENCY (INCFA)
Bay Area American Indian Council, Inc.
440 Santa Clara Avenue, Oakland, CA 94610
(510) 645-1430 (510) 645-1434 FAX
E-Mail: edincfa@aol.com

Many Thanks!

Cristina Rodriguez de La Mar
Executive Director
Indigenous Nations: Child & Family Agency
Bay Area American Indian Council
--

André Cramblit, Operations Director

The Northern California Indian Development Council NCIDC is a non-profit organization that meets the social, educational, and economic development needs of American Indian communities. NCIDC operates a fine art gallery featuring the Tribes of N.W. California. (
<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>*<>






36 Date: 2001-02-10 04:41:32
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Mother Sues School For Intimidating Child, Religious Harassment
by AP, The Associated Press
http://www.imdiversity.com/Article_Detail.asp?Article_ID=3054


DULCE, N.M. (AP) - The Dulce Independent School District has been accused of
violating the civil rights of a fourth-grader by physically and emotionally
harassing him and using a religious rite to intimidate his mother when she
complained about her son's treatment.

Veronica Christie alleges school officials used corporal punishment to
discipline her son, Jonathan Tilley, then tried to use a religious rite
against her, according to a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in
Albuquerque.

The lawsuit contends district regulations do not authorize corporal
punishment or other force against students as disciplinary measures and that
the religious rite violated the Constitution by establishing religion in a
public school.

Defendants include Superintendent Levi Pesata, Dulce Elementary Principle Jim
Cruice, Assistant Principal Terry Nunneley and school counselor Dorothy Gomez.

Pesata said Tuesday he couldn't discuss the lawsuit and referred questions to
the district's attorney, who couldn't immediately be reached for comment.

Last September, Jonathan was taken to the principal's office for being
uncooperative in class and was confronted by Cruice and Nunneley, the lawsuit
says.

"Without any warning or further explanation, the defendant Cruice walked up
to Jonathan and began to scream at Jonathan," the lawsuit says. "The
defendant ... vehemently grabbed Jonathan by the arm, and began dragging
Jonathan down the hall."

The lawsuit, which doesn't specify damages, said the boy suffered emotional
distress and was traumatized because of the incident.

Christie asked Pesata for a report of the incident. The lawsuit claims
Pesata, Gomez and Cruice conspired to withhold information from Christie in
violation of federal law.

Pesata, identified in the complaint as an elder and former president of the
Jicarilla Apache Tribe, then "smoked" or "smudged" areas of the school in
which Christie had worked or been present, the lawsuit says.

"Smoking" or "smudging" is a tribal rite in which smoke from burning
sagebrush is allowed to fill an area to rid the area of evil, believed to be
brought by outsiders or non-members of the Jicarilla tribe, the lawsuit said.

The rites resulted in Christie "being shunned, and otherwise treated as evil
or undesirable by members of the Jicarilla Apache Tribe employed at,
attending or otherwise present at Dulce Elementary School," the lawsuit says.

Christie, who is Cherokee, works at the school as a food service employee.

Juanita Roibal Bradley, the family's attorney, said the lawsuit, filed in
December, was about addressing the conflict between tribal sovereignty and
public schools.

"They have denied what happened and feel sovereign to do what they want and
there is no liability," she said. "It seems appropriate that other people
know what's going on up there. It's a public school and subject to public
scrutiny."

Copyright by The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
{ref: NEW MEXICO }
Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.


35 Date: 2001-02-10 04:38:14
Advocate Reporter (no email / no homepage) wrote:

From: tom kunesh
To: Tennessee Indian Affairs email list
Subject: [tn-ind] "Indian nations back Bend plan"

This story appeared in The Times Free Press on Saturday, February 3,
2001
12:00:00 AM
http://www.timesfreepress.com/2001/feb/03feb01/webmoccbend.html

Indian nations back Bend plan
----------------------------------------------------------------
By Kathy Gilbert, Staff Writer


Five American Indian nations agreed Friday to support legislation
proposed
by Congressman Zach Wamp, R-Chattanooga, to add Moccasin Bend to the
federal park system.

"We encourage you to proceed expeditiously. Generations have waited for
this moment," stated officials of the Five Civilized Tribes in a letter
to
Rep. Wamp. The Choctaw, Chickasaw, Cherokee, Muscogee (Creek) and
Seminole nations say they believe they have ancestral homes and burial
sites on
Moccasin Bend.

Rep. Wamp could not be reached for comment.

Friday's letter is good news for Chattanooga, said Mickey Robbins,
president of the Friends of Moccasin Bend. Friends is a non-profit
organization named by the city and Hamilton County in 1996 as an agent
to
pursue national park status.

The park will be linked to the Tennessee Riverwalk and add a
"second-night"
attraction to the Tennessee Aquarium, Mr. Robbins said. A 1996 economic
study estimated the park could attract 600,000 people every year and
spark
$21.2 million in new spending in the county, he said.

"It's going to become a tremendous asset to Chattanooga," Mr. Robbins
said.

Last week, Rep. Wamp said he planned to move quickly on the park
legislation. His proposal excluded a 156-acre parcel owned by the city
and
county and leased to Wes Brown through 2005 for the Moccasin Bend Public

Golf Course. A 1998 National Park Service study recommended the golf
course
property be included in the park. The park service still stands by that
recommendation, said Pat Reed, Chickamauga and Chattanooga National
Military Park superintendent.

Tom Kunesh, a member of the Chattanooga InterTribal Association,
protested
the golf course's exclusion.

But the Five Civilized Tribes said the park was too critical to hold out

for perfection.

"We prefer the National Park boundary include what we consider to be
hallowed ground contained in the golf course," states the letter from
members of the cultural preservation committee of the Five Civilized
Tribes. "However, the goal of creating the park is the most important
objective. We ask that appropriate language be made part of the
legislation
so that the golf course may be added later."

Local attorney Mike Mahn and Jay Mills, co-vice president of the
Friends,
talked to the Five Civilized Tribes in Oklahoma this week, along with
Vicky
Karhu, local liaison to the tribes. Ms. Karhu also is director for the
Chattanooga Indigenous Resource Center and Library in Red Bank.

Moccasin Bend, named for its foot-shaped appearance and location at a
curve
in the Tennessee River, is rich in American Indian and Civil War
archeological and historical sites, Mr. Mills said.

Rep. Wamp's legislation would add 896 acres to the federal park system.
It
grandfathers in the state mental health hospital at the tip of the bend
and
includes a nearly completed donation of 96 acres from the Rock-Tenn
Corp.
to the Trust for Public Land.

In 1950, Congress enacted legislation authorizing the secretary of the
interior to accept a 1,400-acre donation of Moccasin Bend land to
Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park. In 1953, Tennessee
Gov. Frank Clement blocked the appropriation. Soon after, the city of
Chattanooga built a sewage treatment plant near the site of historic
Brown's Ferry. Much of the area, including the golf course land, was
named
a National Historic Landmark in 1969.
-------------------------------
Chattanooga InterTribal Association (CITA)
http://www.chattanooga.net/cita/

Native American Indian Association of Tennessee
http://www.chattanooga.net/naia/index.html

Native Nashville
http://www.nativenashville.com/




34 Date: 2001-02-10 04:36:53
Advocate Reporter (no email / no homepage) wrote:

]

Inter-Tribal Council
of the
Five Civilized Tribes
Cultural Preservation Committee


Honorable Zach Wamp,
Member of Congress
United States House of Representatives
Washington, D.C.

Re: Moccasin Bend National Park

Dear Representative Wamp:

We wish to express our appreciation for your commitment to introduce
legislation that will create the Moccasin Bend National Park. We
encourage
you to proceed expeditiously. We pledge our support through the
legislative
process.

We are pleased the proposed boundary includes the property owned by
the
State of Tennessee that contains the mental health hospital. We
recognize
the importance of this resource to the regional community and support
the
'grandfathering' of this facility. We are also pleased the park will
include the Trail of Tears Federal Road.

We prefer the National Park boundary include what we consider to be
hallowed ground contained in the golf course. However, we believe at
this
time that the goal of creating the Park is the most important objective.
We
ask that appropriate language be made part of the legislation so that
the
golf course may be added later, should the public owners choose to add
it
to the Park.

Generations have waited for this moment. May you be guided by the same

Spirit to whom we all entrust our lives, our hopes, and our dreams. As
representatives of our respective nations on the Cultural Preservation
Committee (CPC) of the Inter-Tribal Council of the Five Civilized
Tribes,
we are,

Sincerely yours,

Terry Cole, CPC Chair, Choctaw nation of Oklahoma

Rene Duncan, CPC Vice-Chair, Chickasaw Nation

Mary Tidwell, CPC Secretary, Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma

Joyce A. Bear, Muscogee (Creek) Nation

Ted Underwood, Seminole Nation of Oklahoma

[fax transmission date: Jan 31 2001 ]


33 Date: 2001-02-10 04:34:46
Advocate Reporter (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Neighboring tribes set for court battle
FEBRUARY 9, 2001

Citing an 1865 treaty, the Omaha Tribe of Nebraska is seeking the return of
the northern portion of the reservation and has filed suit against the
Department of Interior and other federal agencies.

But also named as a defendant is the neighboring Winnebago Tribe. It was
under the 1865 treaty that the Winnebago Reservation was created after tribal
members had been forced from their ancestral home in Wisconsin and were
subsequently herded throughout the Plains by the government.

They ended up in Nebraska Territory and the Omaha Tribe agreed to sell a
portion of their land for $50,000. Under a provision in the treaty, the tribe
has the right to repurchase the land if their new neighbors caused any
trouble.

Apparently, that trouble most recently came when the Indian Health Services
decided to locate a new hospital on the Winnebago Reservation instead of the
Omaha one. The suit also seeks to stop the contruction of the hospital.

Still, the dispute has old roots when Omaha tribal members began to feel they
were being treated like second-class citizens by the government after
agreeing to sell the land for the benefit of the Winnebagos.

A lawyer for the Winnebago Tribe says the lawsuit is frivolous.

Get the Story:
Omahas Go to Court to Oust Winnebagos (The Omaha World-Herald




32 Date: 2001-02-10 04:32:57
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

http://www.ctnow.com
SIMMONS HOSTS HEARING ON INDIAN POLICIES

Simmons Hosts Hearing On Indian Policies
By LYN BIXBY And DAVID LIGHTMAN
The Hartford Courant
February 09, 2001

If Democrat Sam Gejdenson had done what freshman Republican U.S. Rep. Rob
Simmons is doing today - conducting a hearing on Indian issues - Gejdenson
might have won an 11th term last fall in eastern Connecticut's 2nd
Congressional District.

But Gejdenson didn't have a hearing, and he lost by less than 3,000 votes.

Tribal recognition, casinos and reservation expansion are big issues in the
2nd District, and are gaining momentum around the state. One indication of
their importance was the surprise appearance of U.S. Sen. Christopher J. Dodd
in Hartford Monday advocating a national moratorium on the tribal recognition
process.

Though Simmons has been in Congress for only a month, he clearly caught the
attention of Connecticut's senior senator.

The congressional field hearing that Simmons leads at 10 a.m. today in the
Legislative Office Building in Hartford fulfills a pledge.

"When it came up during the campaign that constituents wanted a hearing, I
was sympathetic to that, and I promised I would do it," Simmons said
Thursday. "It's my hope that we can get some information and recommendations
on the table ... that will allow me to join my colleagues in some legislative
proposals, maybe somewhat along the lines of what Sen. Dodd has offered."

Dodd, a Democrat, announced new, stronger positions on Indian issues at his
Monday press conference and said he would introduce legislation to reform the
tribal recognition process. He applauded Simmons for organizing today's
hearing, and he said he would try to attend.

There has been talk that Dodd is considering a run for governor in 2002 - a
notion he laughed about Thursday but would not completely dismiss - and
having a well-attended Hartford press conference four days before Simmons'
hearing is good politics.

Dodd's positions on Indian affairs show an evolution in his thinking and a
growing sense of outrage over the recognition process. Members of
Connecticut's Washington delegation have felt pressure in recent years to
inch away from tribal constituencies, but Dodd has tried to steer a middle
course.

Even before his Monday press conference, the senator and his staff contacted
representatives of the state's two federally recognized tribes, the
Mashantucket Pequots and the Mohegans.

"Informally, they did not see a problem with what I was saying," Dodd said.
"These cases [of other groups seeking recognition] could be dangerous for
them. It could devalue who gets recognition."

In addition to advocating a moratorium, Dodd also said he would ask Interior
Secretary Gale Norton to re-examine preliminary decisions last year by the
Bureau of Indian Affairs to recognize two North Stonington groups, the
Eastern Pequots and the Paucatuck Eastern Pequots.

The Eastern and Paucatuck decisions have been challenged in court by Attorney
General Richard Blumenthal and three eastern Connecticut towns, North
Stonington, Preston and Ledyard. They accused bureau officials of acting
illegally, in part because the bureau's historians and anthropologists found
that neither group met the seven mandatory criteria for recognition.

Simmons, a 57-year-old former state representative from Stonington, said he
supports a review of the Eastern and Paucatuck decisions, even though he
knows some tribal members and sympathizes with their quest for recognition.

"I think we all respect the fact that Native Americans have a right to be
recognized for their diversity and for their cultural heritage," he said. "On
the other hand, this recognition carries with it what you might call the
casino benefit, which can be disruptive in the larger community. And that's
why this has become a concern, especially in Connecticut."

U.S. Rep. Christopher Shays, a Republican from the 4th District who has been
the Connecticut delegation's most outspoken critic of federal Indian policy,
is not expected to attend Simmons' hearing because of a conflict.

He is in a position to exert some influence as a senior member of the House
Government Reform Committee and a member of its subcommittee that oversees
Bureau of Indian Affairs operations.

"This is a gigantic problem in our state," Shays said this week. "We're
looking at a state that's going to be filled with casinos."

The Mashantucket Pequots and the Mohegans own two of the world's largest
casinos, both in eastern Connecticut, and an attempt by the Mashantuckets to
expand their reservation beyond boundaries set by Congress sparked a six-year
court battle with Blumenthal and the three surrounding towns. The case is
being considered by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Simmons has opposed Mashantucket reservation expansion, as has U.S. Sen.
Joseph I. Lieberman. But Gejdenson did not join them, and he came to be
regarded as unresponsive on Indian issues, particularly in the towns of North
Stonington, Preston and Ledyard.

Anti-Gejdenson feelings hardened last year with the publication of a book
that made the case that the Mashantuckets are not a legitimate tribe and that
Congress was duped in 1983 when it gave them federal recognition. Gejdenson
was portrayed as the tribe's main congressional advocate in the book,
"Without Reservation," by Jeff Benedict.

In last fall's election, Simmons portrayed Gejdenson as out of touch with his
district. But Simmons declined to speculate Thursday on how the election
might have turned out if Gejdenson had simply agreed to have a hearing on
Indian issues.






31 Date: 2001-02-10 04:31:07
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Tribe says land claim distorted
FEBRUARY 9, 2001

George Tiger, spokesperson for the Miami Nation of Oklahoma, on Thursday said
the tribe's 2.6 million acre land claim is about treaty rights not a casino.

The tribe last year filed its claim to the Illinois land but Tiger said the
governor's office brought up the idea of settling the claim for a casino.
According to Tiger, Chief Floyd Leonard didn't say a casino was the tribe's
goal but would be considered as "one of the negotiation points."

"From that day on, it's always: 'Tribe wants casino in Illinois," said Tiger.
Tiger made his remarks at an American Indian Chamber of Commerce luncheon in
Tulsa.

The tribe filed the land claim against 15 randomly chosen private landowners
because the state of Illinois didn't exist, said Tiger. Tiger says the tribe
is willing to negotiate with the state.

Thomas C. Wilmont Sr., a New York deveoloper, has said he was paying for most
of the tribe's lawsuit as a business investment.

Senator: Tribe must play by the rules
JULY 26, 2000

Senator Peter Fitzgerald (R-Illinois) introduced legislation on Monday aimed
at helping citizens of his state fight a 2.6-million-acre land claims suit
filed by the Miami Nation of Oklahoma.

"Citizens are granted certain legal protections when they are sued by a
business associate, a relative, the government, or practically anyone else,"
said Fitzgerald on Tuesday. "Why shouldn't these protections apply when a
family is sued by a tribe?"

Fitzgerald said The Landowners Defenses Against Property Claims by Indian
Tribes will force the tribe to "play by the same rules ... as everyone else."
To level the playing field, the bill would allow the landowners in Illinois
to use state law against the tribe's claims.

Applying state law to an area traditionally governed only by federal law
might raise red flags for some, particularly in light of recent events
surrounding the Washington State Republican Party. Treaties, various Supreme
Court decisions, and the Constitution make it clear federal law governs areas
Indian affairs.

But a spokesperson for the Miami Nation says the proposed legislation doesn't
worry the tribe at all.

"It doesn't affect the claim one bit," said George Tiger on Tuesday. Tiger
said he believes the legislation is simply a response to criticism the state
has endured by its own citizens.

Since the law adds a new section to the portion of the United States Code
affecting Indians and tribes, it could presumably be used in all future land
claims filed by tribes, with one notable exception. The law would not apply
when a governmental entity, such as a state or the federal government, is
named as a defendant.

The Miami Nation's lawsuit, filed in US District Court in East St. Louis,
Illinois doesn't name the state, but it does name individual landowners. The
15 families were picked at random to represent land in 15 counties along the
Wabash River which the tribe says the federal government promised them in the
Treaty of Grouseland of 1805.

"The United States do hereby engage to consider them [The Miami and other
tribes] as joint owners of all the country on the Wabash and its waters,"
states the treaty. Although the tribe signed subsequent treaties ceding
parcels of land to the government, they say the Wabash land was not one of
them.




30 Date: 2001-02-09 12:25:29
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

FBI: We turned over confidential informant documents to locals
By Jay Lindsay,
Associated Press, 2/8/2001 18:40
http://www.boston.com/cgi-bin/new_passiton.cgi

BOSTON (AP) The FBI broke its silence Thursday on charges that it allowed
innocent men to go to prison to protect mob informants, saying local
authorities had FBI documents that could have exonerated the men.

The statement came the day Joseph Salvati who spent 30 years in prison
outlined plans to sue various government agencies he said framed him for a
murder he didn't commit.

The FBI has been taken a public relations beating since December, when the
Justice Department released confidential informant memos from March 1965,
when Chelsea thug Edward Deegan was murdered.

The documents showed FBI agents knew about the hit on Deegan ahead of time,
and had a list of six men who did it.

FBI informant Vincent ''Jimmy the Bear'' Flemmi was on the list, but was
never charged. Salvati, 68, Peter Limone, 66, and two others convicted for
the crime were not on the list.

Salvati and Limone were cleared early this month, and Superior Court Judge
Margaret Hinkle said there was a ''stain'' of the FBI's legacy because it
hadn't given the documents to prosecutors.

But the FBI statement Thursday said the agency did pass along the documents.

The statement said the FBI was conducting a review to find documents relevant
to the Deegan murder.

''To date, our review has disclosed documents indicating that the
confidential source information recently released, which directly relates to
the Deegan homicide, was disseminated to local authorities in 1965,'' the
statement read.

The FBI did not specify who the ''local authorities'' were, and would not
comment further. The Suffolk County District Attorney's Office prosecuted the
case, and the Chelsea police were involved in the investigation.

In a statement, the Suffolk County District Attorney's Office denied
receiving informants' memos.

''As we stated in court during the Salvati and Limone hearings, this office
first became aware of the FBI confidential informant memos when they were
provided to us by the Department of Justice Task Force on Dec. 19, 2000. We
have discovered no evidence indicating that these memos were provided to this
office at any prior time.''

Chelsea police said no one was available for comment.

John Cavicchi, an attorney for Limone, said the police, the district attorney
and FBI are all to blame.

''Everybody's starting to point fingers at each other,'' he said. ''They all
lied and covered up the case.''

He added that the FBI allowed an agent to testify for the prosecution in the
Deegan case, even though they had the memos.

At Salvati's news conference Thursday, attorney Vincent Garo charged that
Chelsea police and the Suffolk County District Attorney's office were also
part of the cover-up.

He released a Chelsea police report in which an informant reported that
hitman Joseph Barboza and Flemmi left the Ebb Tide cafe in Chelsea with four
men none of whom were Salvati or Limone the night of Deegan's murder, then
returned later, and one man said, ''We nailed him.'' Barboza later became the
prosecution's star witness.

Garo presented an affidavit from a prosecutor confirming the office had the
Chelsea police report during the trial.

Suffolk County District Attorney spokesman Jim Borghesani declined to
comment.

Members of Salvati's family watched the hourlong news conference at the Park
Plaza Hotel, at times holding hands and weeping.

Garo said he would seek a congressional investigation, and criticized the
government for not already settling with Salvati.

''They want us to spend years in litigation,'' he said. ''Damn them. If
that's what I have to do, we're going to do it.''

The Justice Department is investigating allegations that some Boston FBI
agents grew too friendly with mobsters who were their informants and were
corrupted by the mobsters.

Former agent John Connolly is already under indictment on racketeering
charges.



Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.


29 Date: 2001-02-09 12:22:42
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

!

Thursday, February 8, 2001
Idaho panel OKs removal of word
http://www.spokesmanreview.com/news-story.asp?date=020801&ID=s918387&cat=secti

on.Tribal_news


BOISE _ The Senate State Affairs Committee unanimously approved a measure to
remove the word "squaw" from Idaho place names Wednesday.

The bill would create a committee to identify all place names in Idaho with
the word squaw, a word that is offensive to Native Americans.

It would then set in motion a process to examine each case for historical
significance and decide if the name should be changed.

The bill now heads to the full Senate for approval


Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.


[ Edit | View ]

News and Issues -- Anonymous, 09:26:55 03/12/01 Mon

Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

http://www.newsday.com/ap/regional/ap298.htm

School tosses team name deemed offensive to Indians
SARANAC LAKE, N.Y. (AP) - Mirroring a growing trend, a school board Wednesday
''honorably retired'' the Redskins name from the district's sports teams.

The 6-1 vote by the Saranac Lake board ended a three month tug-of-war between
those who called the name insulting and others who said it was source of
pride for alumni.

At the meeting, three American Indians told the board the name brought harsh
feelings of 500 years of mistreatment.

''This evening we have come to teach the people the true meaning of the word
Redskin and why it is so demeaning to our people,'' said Alice Euber, before
presenting a short video depicting the massacre and skinning of American
Indians. ''We do not call ourselves Redskins. We don't call you White Skins.''

''I am desperately trying to make you understand how we feel about the word
Redskin,'' said Kodata Britton. ''It's a terrible hurt.''

Former athletes said they were proud to play sports as Redskins, calling the
name a source of pride for five decades. The team's original name was Red and
White. Saranac Lake is 116 miles north of Albany.

Before the meetings, Miles Van Nortwick, the lone dissenter, said the board
and the community should be ''very, very cautious'' on the issue.
{REF: NEW YORK MASCOT }



27 Date: 2001-02-09 12:19:25
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Black Mesa Trust, Feds to Investigate N-aquifer Damage
Navajo Hopi Observer
http://www.navajohopiobserver.com/navajohopiobserver/myarticles.asp?P=362204&S

=392&PubID=6171&EC=0

KYKOTSMOVI—The Natural Resources Defense Council has concluded that Peabody
Coal Company’s pumping of ground water for its coal-slurry operation on Black
Mesa may already have caused substantial damage to the Navajo aquifer in
Northern Arizona.

The Council’s report, “Drawdown: Groundwater Mining on Black Mesa,” gives
added weight to the concerns of Hopi farmers and ranchers who have long
maintained that their traditional seeps and springs fed by the N-aquifer are
drying up.

On February 7, Black Mesa Trust founder and executive director Vernon
Masayesva and the Trust’s president Leonard Selestewa, as well as David
Beckman, senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, will meet
in Denver, Colorado with representatives of four federal agencies to present
the Council’s findings.

Peabody Coal Company uses N-aquifer water to slurry coal from the Kayenta
Mine on Black Mesa to the Mohave Generating Plant in Laughlin, Nevada, 273
miles away.

“This meeting is welcome news,” said Mr. Masayesva, “but I hope that
whatever comes out of the meeting will not just be another excuse to delay
resolution of serious water depletion issues on Black Mesa and the settlement
of the Little Colorado River water rights adjudication. Black Mesa Trust
remains firmly committed to ending Peabody’s use of N-aquifer water by the
end of the year 2004.”

The N-aquifer is the sole source of drinking water for the Hopi Reservation
and parts of the Navajo Reservation, and therefore its long-term health is
critically important to both tribes. Peabody Coal Company currently drains
hundreds of millions of gallons a year from the aquifer for its coal-slurry
operation.

The federal agencies that will be involved in the meeting are the United
States Geological Survey, the Office of Surface Mining, the Bureau of Indian
Affairs and the Bureau of Reclamation.

Arizona Senator Jon Kyl has secured funding for studying the Black Mesa water
issue as part of the $1 million in the 2001 Energy and Water Development
appropriation for the Bureau of Reclamation to study water projects to serve
municipal and industrial uses on Hopi and Navajo as part of the settlement of
Little Colorado River water rights.

David Hayes, Deputy Secretary of the Interior, stated in his memo of January
19 to the four federal agencies that an investigation and analysis of the
N-aquifer will include “a review of recent N-aquifer studies conducted by
private, government and tribal agencies, incorporation of updated information
into the USGS groundwater model originally constructed in the 1980s, and
recalibration of the USGS model using currently available data and up-to-date
calibration methods.”

Until now, Peabody Coal Company and the federal government have maintained,
based on the current USGS computer model, that no significant damage to the
N-aquifer has occurred or will occur due to the company’s pumping of water
from the ancient aquifer. Peabody and OSMRE have consistently maintained that
that during the life of the mine the mining company will use only one-half of
one percent of the water available in the aquifer.

However, NRDC’s report, issued in October of last year, found that at least
one of the federal government’s criteria for assessing material damage to the
aquifer has been exceeded.

Based on the same evidence reported to OSMRE, (the Interior Department’s
Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement), NRDC determined that
the structural stability of the aquifer may already have been compromised.

The stability of the aquifer is determined by evaluating its internal water
pressure, which is determined by a measure called potentionmetric head, or
the height to which confined liquid will rise when tapped by a well.

The government’s standard for the N-aquifer is that water in the well
should rise at least 100 feet above the aquifer’s top; if the water level
falls below this level, material, in this case structural, damage to the
aquifer could occur.

NRDC’s report, based on a two-year study of the federal government’s and
Peabody’s own data, found that in two of the 15 monitoring wells, the water
level was only slightly above the top of the aquifer, nowhere near the 100
feet above the aquifer required by the assessment criterion. Since this
criterion has been exceeded, “OSMRE’s finding that no material damage has
occurred [to the N-aquifer] is without foundation,” according to the NRDC
report.

When the Hopi and Navajo Tribes initially signed mining leases with Peabody
in the mid 1960s, with the approval of the Department of the Interior, then
Interior Secretary Stewart Udall was concerned that pumping a billion gallons
of water a year from the aquifer might cause damage to the structural
integrity of the aquifer, the quality of the water within the aquifer, or the
discharge into seeps and springs fed by the aquifer. Secretary Udall put an
escape clause into the leases stating that if Peabody’s water pumping
adversely affected the aquifer in any one of those four ways, the use of
groundwater from the N-aquifer could be stopped by the federal government.

Responding to concerns raised by the Hopi Tribe, Manuel Lujan, Secretary of
the Interior during former President George H. Bush’s administration,
initiated an Alternative Transportation Study to evaluate alternatives to the
use of the coal slurry pipeline and to the use of N-aquifer water for the
slurry operation. Phases I (a literature review on coal transportation by
slurry and rail) and II (a look at other sources of water for the slurry
operation, including a pipeline from Lake Powell, as well as a further
examination of alternative methods for moving the coal) of the study were
completed while Secretary Lujan deferred a his decision on permitting the
Black Mesa mine.

Phase III, however, was put on hold when President Clinton took office and
Bruce Babbitt was appointed Secretary of the Interior.

“Secretary Babbitt convinced the Navajo and Hopi Tribes to support shelving
the alternative transportation studies and making the coal slurry pipeline
issue part of the overall negotiations for the settlement of Little Colorado
River water rights,” said Mr. Masayesva, who is a former chairman of the Hopi
Tribe.

“That decision was like mixing apples and oranges,” he said. “The N-aquifer
water is groundwater and the Little Colorado River is surface water.

“Secretary Babbitt lived with us all his life. Everyone said he would take
care of the N-aquifer problem, but he just made its resolution more
complicated.”

Last December, Secretary Babbitt refused to meet with Black Mesa Trust to
receive a petition signed by more than 3,000 people representing, among
others, most households on the Hopi Reservation. The petition requested that
the Secretary invoke existing federal regulations to prevent Peabody Coal
Company from continuing to use N-aquifer water to slurry coal to the Mohave
Generating Plant, based on NRDC’s findings that one of the government’s own
criteria for assessing damage to the aquifer had been exceeded.

The February 7 meeting in Denver comes partly as a result of the hundreds of
letters sent to Secretary Babbitt by Black Mesa Trust supporters, said Mr.
Masayesva.

During the meeting, Black Mesa Trust will present NRDC’s findings and
conclusions, which include recommending that Peabody cease groundwater
pumping from the N-aquifer no later than 2005 and that the company should
reduce its use of N-aquifer water by December 31 of this year. In addition,
the report recommends completion of the alternative transportation study
begun in the early1990s during former President Bush’s administration.

“We hope that President George W. Bush will complete the work to save the
N-aquifer that was begun by his father,” stated Mr. Masayesva.

Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.


26 Date: 2001-02-09 12:18:01
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

story lead from Victor Rocha...thanks!
www.pechanga.net

Jury Still Out on Navajos' Role in Utah Courts

BY DAWN HOUSE
THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
http://www.sltrib.com/02072001/utah/69269.htm

Six years ago, Utah officials envisioned teaming up with the Navajo
Nation for more equitable treatment of American Indians within the state
court system.

The plan was to ensure that American Indians would be fairly represented on
juries, juvenile probationers would be continuously supervised and protective
orders routinely enforced, whether or not the subjects lived on the
reservation.

But state officials say a cooperative agreement with the Navajo Nation has
not advanced beyond the issue of American Indians serving on state juries in
San Juan County. On Tuesday, the Utah Supreme Court sent a lawsuit over that
issue back to the trial court for further hearings over attorney's fees.

"It's been disappointing, but we're not giving up,'' said Brent Johnson,
general counsel for the Utah Judicial Council. "From our standpoint, we're
ready to go -- an agreement is there in principle. We're now waiting for
approval from the Navajo Nation side."

The jury representation suit dates back to 1993, when Navajo Loren Crank Jr.
brought a civil-rights action against the Utah Judicial Council. He alleged
he and other American Indians were being illegally excluded from serving as
jurors in San Juan County, where more than half the residents are descended
from indigenous Americans.

Crank's legal team showed that no American Indian served on a jury in eastern
Utah from 1932 to 1960, and only a handful up until the early 1990s. State
officials blamed the lack of Utah driver licenses and voter registration
among American Indians on master juror lists.

By 1995, the Judicial Council had worked out a settlement in the Crank case
providing for the names of prospective jurors to come from a third source:
the Navajo Nation. Under the historic tentative agreement, a list generated
twice-yearly of 500 names of prospective jurors in San Juan County would
include 52 percent American Indians, plus or minus 5 percent. Navajos living
on the reservation would be summoned by the Tribal Council -- not the state
-- to answer the juror questionnaire or explain why they did not appear for
jury duty.

Said Johnson in 1995: "We know of no other agreement like this in the
country. Hopefully, this will open the door for even more cooperation.'' On
Tuesday, Johnson said: "I had no idea how difficult this was going to be."

But James Zion, solicitor general to the Court of the Navajo Nation,
predicted Tuesday that a resolution empowering the Tribal Council to summon
members for jury duty in Utah could be drafted within the next several weeks.

"We've had a good relationship with Utah judges, but we've been slow in
getting this off the ground," said Zion from his office in Albuquerque, N.M.
"It's hard when you can only bring folks together a couple of times a year."

In Tuesday's 20-page Utah court ruling, justices acknowledged that
establishing protocols to ensure equitable representation of American Indians
on San Juan County juries and obtaining accurate lists of tribal members has
been "more complicated than anticipated."

Both plaintiff Crank and 7th District Judge Lyle Anderson have asked to be
awarded their attorney's fees, each accusing the other of wrongdoing. At one
point in the litigation, Crank's attorneys accused Anderson of "racist
conduct'' in allegedly denying tribal members seats on juries. The Supreme
Court justices, however, said Anderson had not violated any court orders.

The Supreme Court did not resolve the competing claims for attorney fees,
sending the case back to court for further consideration on narrow points of
law. No judge has been appointed in the case to take the place of Judge David
Roth, who has since retired.



© Copyright 2001, The Salt Lake Tribune
Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.


[ Edit | View ]

News and Issues -- Anonymous, 09:26:20 03/12/01 Mon

Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

http://www.newsday.com/ap/regional/ap298.htm

School tosses team name deemed offensive to Indians
SARANAC LAKE, N.Y. (AP) - Mirroring a growing trend, a school board Wednesday
''honorably retired'' the Redskins name from the district's sports teams.

The 6-1 vote by the Saranac Lake board ended a three month tug-of-war between
those who called the name insulting and others who said it was source of
pride for alumni.

At the meeting, three American Indians told the board the name brought harsh
feelings of 500 years of mistreatment.

''This evening we have come to teach the people the true meaning of the word
Redskin and why it is so demeaning to our people,'' said Alice Euber, before
presenting a short video depicting the massacre and skinning of American
Indians. ''We do not call ourselves Redskins. We don't call you White Skins.''

''I am desperately trying to make you understand how we feel about the word
Redskin,'' said Kodata Britton. ''It's a terrible hurt.''

Former athletes said they were proud to play sports as Redskins, calling the
name a source of pride for five decades. The team's original name was Red and
White. Saranac Lake is 116 miles north of Albany.

Before the meetings, Miles Van Nortwick, the lone dissenter, said the board
and the community should be ''very, very cautious'' on the issue.
{REF: NEW YORK MASCOT }



27 Date: 2001-02-09 12:19:25
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Black Mesa Trust, Feds to Investigate N-aquifer Damage
Navajo Hopi Observer
http://www.navajohopiobserver.com/navajohopiobserver/myarticles.asp?P=362204&S

=392&PubID=6171&EC=0

KYKOTSMOVI—The Natural Resources Defense Council has concluded that Peabody
Coal Company’s pumping of ground water for its coal-slurry operation on Black
Mesa may already have caused substantial damage to the Navajo aquifer in
Northern Arizona.

The Council’s report, “Drawdown: Groundwater Mining on Black Mesa,” gives
added weight to the concerns of Hopi farmers and ranchers who have long
maintained that their traditional seeps and springs fed by the N-aquifer are
drying up.

On February 7, Black Mesa Trust founder and executive director Vernon
Masayesva and the Trust’s president Leonard Selestewa, as well as David
Beckman, senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, will meet
in Denver, Colorado with representatives of four federal agencies to present
the Council’s findings.

Peabody Coal Company uses N-aquifer water to slurry coal from the Kayenta
Mine on Black Mesa to the Mohave Generating Plant in Laughlin, Nevada, 273
miles away.

“This meeting is welcome news,” said Mr. Masayesva, “but I hope that
whatever comes out of the meeting will not just be another excuse to delay
resolution of serious water depletion issues on Black Mesa and the settlement
of the Little Colorado River water rights adjudication. Black Mesa Trust
remains firmly committed to ending Peabody’s use of N-aquifer water by the
end of the year 2004.”

The N-aquifer is the sole source of drinking water for the Hopi Reservation
and parts of the Navajo Reservation, and therefore its long-term health is
critically important to both tribes. Peabody Coal Company currently drains
hundreds of millions of gallons a year from the aquifer for its coal-slurry
operation.

The federal agencies that will be involved in the meeting are the United
States Geological Survey, the Office of Surface Mining, the Bureau of Indian
Affairs and the Bureau of Reclamation.

Arizona Senator Jon Kyl has secured funding for studying the Black Mesa water
issue as part of the $1 million in the 2001 Energy and Water Development
appropriation for the Bureau of Reclamation to study water projects to serve
municipal and industrial uses on Hopi and Navajo as part of the settlement of
Little Colorado River water rights.

David Hayes, Deputy Secretary of the Interior, stated in his memo of January
19 to the four federal agencies that an investigation and analysis of the
N-aquifer will include “a review of recent N-aquifer studies conducted by
private, government and tribal agencies, incorporation of updated information
into the USGS groundwater model originally constructed in the 1980s, and
recalibration of the USGS model using currently available data and up-to-date
calibration methods.”

Until now, Peabody Coal Company and the federal government have maintained,
based on the current USGS computer model, that no significant damage to the
N-aquifer has occurred or will occur due to the company’s pumping of water
from the ancient aquifer. Peabody and OSMRE have consistently maintained that
that during the life of the mine the mining company will use only one-half of
one percent of the water available in the aquifer.

However, NRDC’s report, issued in October of last year, found that at least
one of the federal government’s criteria for assessing material damage to the
aquifer has been exceeded.

Based on the same evidence reported to OSMRE, (the Interior Department’s
Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement), NRDC determined that
the structural stability of the aquifer may already have been compromised.

The stability of the aquifer is determined by evaluating its internal water
pressure, which is determined by a measure called potentionmetric head, or
the height to which confined liquid will rise when tapped by a well.

The government’s standard for the N-aquifer is that water in the well
should rise at least 100 feet above the aquifer’s top; if the water level
falls below this level, material, in this case structural, damage to the
aquifer could occur.

NRDC’s report, based on a two-year study of the federal government’s and
Peabody’s own data, found that in two of the 15 monitoring wells, the water
level was only slightly above the top of the aquifer, nowhere near the 100
feet above the aquifer required by the assessment criterion. Since this
criterion has been exceeded, “OSMRE’s finding that no material damage has
occurred [to the N-aquifer] is without foundation,” according to the NRDC
report.

When the Hopi and Navajo Tribes initially signed mining leases with Peabody
in the mid 1960s, with the approval of the Department of the Interior, then
Interior Secretary Stewart Udall was concerned that pumping a billion gallons
of water a year from the aquifer might cause damage to the structural
integrity of the aquifer, the quality of the water within the aquifer, or the
discharge into seeps and springs fed by the aquifer. Secretary Udall put an
escape clause into the leases stating that if Peabody’s water pumping
adversely affected the aquifer in any one of those four ways, the use of
groundwater from the N-aquifer could be stopped by the federal government.

Responding to concerns raised by the Hopi Tribe, Manuel Lujan, Secretary of
the Interior during former President George H. Bush’s administration,
initiated an Alternative Transportation Study to evaluate alternatives to the
use of the coal slurry pipeline and to the use of N-aquifer water for the
slurry operation. Phases I (a literature review on coal transportation by
slurry and rail) and II (a look at other sources of water for the slurry
operation, including a pipeline from Lake Powell, as well as a further
examination of alternative methods for moving the coal) of the study were
completed while Secretary Lujan deferred a his decision on permitting the
Black Mesa mine.

Phase III, however, was put on hold when President Clinton took office and
Bruce Babbitt was appointed Secretary of the Interior.

“Secretary Babbitt convinced the Navajo and Hopi Tribes to support shelving
the alternative transportation studies and making the coal slurry pipeline
issue part of the overall negotiations for the settlement of Little Colorado
River water rights,” said Mr. Masayesva, who is a former chairman of the Hopi
Tribe.

“That decision was like mixing apples and oranges,” he said. “The N-aquifer
water is groundwater and the Little Colorado River is surface water.

“Secretary Babbitt lived with us all his life. Everyone said he would take
care of the N-aquifer problem, but he just made its resolution more
complicated.”

Last December, Secretary Babbitt refused to meet with Black Mesa Trust to
receive a petition signed by more than 3,000 people representing, among
others, most households on the Hopi Reservation. The petition requested that
the Secretary invoke existing federal regulations to prevent Peabody Coal
Company from continuing to use N-aquifer water to slurry coal to the Mohave
Generating Plant, based on NRDC’s findings that one of the government’s own
criteria for assessing damage to the aquifer had been exceeded.

The February 7 meeting in Denver comes partly as a result of the hundreds of
letters sent to Secretary Babbitt by Black Mesa Trust supporters, said Mr.
Masayesva.

During the meeting, Black Mesa Trust will present NRDC’s findings and
conclusions, which include recommending that Peabody cease groundwater
pumping from the N-aquifer no later than 2005 and that the company should
reduce its use of N-aquifer water by December 31 of this year. In addition,
the report recommends completion of the alternative transportation study
begun in the early1990s during former President Bush’s administration.

“We hope that President George W. Bush will complete the work to save the
N-aquifer that was begun by his father,” stated Mr. Masayesva.

Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.


26 Date: 2001-02-09 12:18:01
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

story lead from Victor Rocha...thanks!
www.pechanga.net

Jury Still Out on Navajos' Role in Utah Courts

BY DAWN HOUSE
THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
http://www.sltrib.com/02072001/utah/69269.htm

Six years ago, Utah officials envisioned teaming up with the Navajo
Nation for more equitable treatment of American Indians within the state
court system.

The plan was to ensure that American Indians would be fairly represented on
juries, juvenile probationers would be continuously supervised and protective
orders routinely enforced, whether or not the subjects lived on the
reservation.

But state officials say a cooperative agreement with the Navajo Nation has
not advanced beyond the issue of American Indians serving on state juries in
San Juan County. On Tuesday, the Utah Supreme Court sent a lawsuit over that
issue back to the trial court for further hearings over attorney's fees.

"It's been disappointing, but we're not giving up,'' said Brent Johnson,
general counsel for the Utah Judicial Council. "From our standpoint, we're
ready to go -- an agreement is there in principle. We're now waiting for
approval from the Navajo Nation side."

The jury representation suit dates back to 1993, when Navajo Loren Crank Jr.
brought a civil-rights action against the Utah Judicial Council. He alleged
he and other American Indians were being illegally excluded from serving as
jurors in San Juan County, where more than half the residents are descended
from indigenous Americans.

Crank's legal team showed that no American Indian served on a jury in eastern
Utah from 1932 to 1960, and only a handful up until the early 1990s. State
officials blamed the lack of Utah driver licenses and voter registration
among American Indians on master juror lists.

By 1995, the Judicial Council had worked out a settlement in the Crank case
providing for the names of prospective jurors to come from a third source:
the Navajo Nation. Under the historic tentative agreement, a list generated
twice-yearly of 500 names of prospective jurors in San Juan County would
include 52 percent American Indians, plus or minus 5 percent. Navajos living
on the reservation would be summoned by the Tribal Council -- not the state
-- to answer the juror questionnaire or explain why they did not appear for
jury duty.

Said Johnson in 1995: "We know of no other agreement like this in the
country. Hopefully, this will open the door for even more cooperation.'' On
Tuesday, Johnson said: "I had no idea how difficult this was going to be."

But James Zion, solicitor general to the Court of the Navajo Nation,
predicted Tuesday that a resolution empowering the Tribal Council to summon
members for jury duty in Utah could be drafted within the next several weeks.

"We've had a good relationship with Utah judges, but we've been slow in
getting this off the ground," said Zion from his office in Albuquerque, N.M.
"It's hard when you can only bring folks together a couple of times a year."

In Tuesday's 20-page Utah court ruling, justices acknowledged that
establishing protocols to ensure equitable representation of American Indians
on San Juan County juries and obtaining accurate lists of tribal members has
been "more complicated than anticipated."

Both plaintiff Crank and 7th District Judge Lyle Anderson have asked to be
awarded their attorney's fees, each accusing the other of wrongdoing. At one
point in the litigation, Crank's attorneys accused Anderson of "racist
conduct'' in allegedly denying tribal members seats on juries. The Supreme
Court justices, however, said Anderson had not violated any court orders.

The Supreme Court did not resolve the competing claims for attorney fees,
sending the case back to court for further consideration on narrow points of
law. No judge has been appointed in the case to take the place of Judge David
Roth, who has since retired.



© Copyright 2001, The Salt Lake Tribune
Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.


[ Edit | View ]

News and Issues -- Anonymous, 09:24:23 03/12/01 Mon

Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

25 Date: 2001-02-09 12:16:24
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

story lead from Victor Rocha...thanks!
www.pechanga.net


Tribal group seeks recognition, sues Mohegans

By Eileen McNamara - More Articles
Published on 2/8/2001
http://www.theday.com/news/ts-re.asp?NewsUID=3B5EB7CC-418F-4407-A451-DD0A68508

9FC

A Norwich tribal group has submitted a petition for federal recognition,
claiming to be the rightful descendants of the historic Mohegan Indian tribe,
and has sued the federally recognized Mohegans, seeking gaming proceeds from
their Mohegan Sun casino.

The Native American Mohegans, who have headquarters in Norwich, claim in the
lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Hartford that Congress and
Connecticut officials wrongly forged a land claims settlement with the
Mohegan Tribal Nation after it was recognized by the Bureau of Indian Affairs
in 1994. Two years later, the tribe opened Mohegan Sun, which last year
grossed more than $814 million.

The lawsuit, filed last October, claims that when they pursued their petition
for federal recognition, the Mohegan Indians wrongly excluded the Norwich
Mohegan faction. The federally recognized tribe now has about 1,600 members.

A spokesman for the Native American Mohegans said that while the group shares
the same history as the federally recognized Mohegans, the Norwich faction
wants to be recognized separately. Last week the group, which in 1992 filed
with the BIA a letter of intent to petition for recognition, delivered to the
agency its full petition and asked that the BIA put it on the agency's
“active” list.

Given the BIA's backlog of more than 200 petitions, it typically takes years
for a tribe's petition to be placed on the active list. This week,
Connecticut's U.S. senators called for reform of the recognition process and
a moratorium on tribal acknowledgments, in part because of concerns over the
preliminary recognition the BIA granted the Paucatuck Eastern Pequots and the
Eastern Pequots of North Stonington.

The Norwich Mohegan group has a financial backer, could make its own land
claims, and may seek to develop a casino, said Joseph T. Findaro, the group's
Washington, D.C., representative. Tribal officials would not say where the
land claims could be made or who is backing the tribe.

Because the federally recognized Mohegan Tribe barred the Norwich faction
from its acknowledgment petition, the Norwich group is seeking a share of the
gaming revenues from Mohegan Sun, Findaro said.

“We have several core families who have been part of the tribe dating back to
the last century,” Findaro said. The federally recognized Mohegan tribe
excluded those members, he said, because the Mohegans only included members
of certain family lines in its petition.

“They essentially disenfranchised our people, they didn't do the proper
research,” Findaro said. “We're basically saying that this 1994 (settlement)
did not extinguish our land claims.”

Jayne Fawcett, tribal ambassador for the Mohegan Indians, said her tribe
believes the lawsuit has no merit and that all true Mohegans were included in
her tribe's recognition petition.

“We were very careful to include all of the people who were Mohegans in our
original federal recognition petition,” Fawcett said. “Obviously, there were
a great many things that went into this. For instance, they had to be people
who had been members of the Mohegan community, they had to be able to
demonstrate social and political community, in addition to genealogy. They
had to be tribal.”

Findaro said the members of the Native American Mohegans meet those criteria.

“We believe we were the original tree trunk of the tribe,” he said. He added
that when the Montville Mohegans were denied preliminary recognition in the
late 1980s, the tribe used some of the Norwich group's history to address
deficiencies in their petition, which allowed them to win final recognition.

The Native American Mohegan group has about 645 members and is lead by
Eleanor Fortin. The group's members claim descent through John Hamilton and
some of his followers. Hamilton was a Mohegan Indian who split from the
Montville Mohegan tribe in the 1970s and whose followers regarded him as
“sachem for life” of the Mohegans. The federally recognized Mohegans have
acknowledged that Hamilton was Mohegan, but have said he adopted non-Mohegans
into his group.

The Norwich Mohegans have asked the BIA to incorporate into its recognition
petition portions of the Montville Mohegan tribe's petition, arguing that
both share the same history and that the Norwich group “should have been
included in the BIA's review” of the Mohegan Tribe's petition.

“The Mohegan Tribe of Indians of Connecticut is not the sole, exclusive
successor in interest to the aboriginal Mohegan Tribe,” Fortin said in a
letter accompanying her group's recognition petition.

Until a few years ago, the Native American Mohegans went by the name Mohegan
Tribe and Nation, Inc. The group became embroiled in a leadership dispute
several years ago when Moigu Standing Bear, a self-proclaimed leader of the
group, sought to oust Fortin. Findora said Standing Bear was a non-Mohegan
who was never considered a legitimate member of the tribe.

The federally recognized Mohegans unsuccessfully sued the Norwich group
several years ago in an attempt to stop them from using the Mohegan name.

Membership disputes among Indian tribes and power struggles between groups
are becoming more frequent as Indian gaming increases throughout the country.
There are several other Indian groups in Connecticut seeking recognition
whose members claim that they either descend from Mohegans, the Mashantucket
Pequots, or both, but do not meet the membership criteria for either tribe.

One family with members in Norwich has filed complaints with Congress that
they have been barred from membership in the Mashantucket tribe even though
they can prove they descend from known Pequots who lived on the tribe's
Ledyard reservation in the 1800s. Federal law, however, allows tribes to
establish their own membership rolls.
Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.


24 Date: 2001-02-09 12:14:41
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

- Local governments receive 27 grants; plans include pumper truck, road
repair, buildings

PESHAWBESTOWN - A record amount of grant money representing 2 percent of
tribal gaming revenue has been earmarked for local governments, the Grand
Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians announced this week.

Twenty-seven grants totaling $1,058,727 will be paid to local governmental
units in Leelanau, Benzie, Antrim, Charlevoix and Grand Traverse counties.
The band makes those payments twice a year under a 1990 consent decree with
the state. The grants represent 2 percent of the band's video gaming revenue
at its Leelanau Sands and Turtle Creek casinos, meaning the band grossed more
than $50 million in the second half of 2000.

Tribal officials said the amount is the largest yet paid out by the band and
only the second time the bi-annual payments have exceeded $1 million.

The largest single award this cycle was $203,197 for the Leelanau County Road
Commission for road repairs on Peshawbestown Road. The agency also will get
$50,000 for equipment purchases and $10,000 to design intersection
improvements at M-22 and Stallman Road.

The Native American Liaison Program for Antrim County Schools also received
$130,000 to construct a new building on the Indian mission property in
Kewadin.

The Suttons Bay-Bingham fire and rescue squad in Leelanau County is getting
$123,000 for a new pumper truck. The department's 1987 pumper will be turned
over to the band's fire department.

Other grants included $100,000 to the Milton Township Fire Department in
Antrim County toward construction of a new fire station. Milton Township also
is getting $42,000 for a skate park at the township park.

Some of the other awards include the following:

- The East Jordan Firefighters Association will get $99,400 to install a
30,000-gallon water tank on tribal land in Charlevoix County.

- St. James Township on Beaver Island will get about $50,000 for street and
parking lot paving in the village.

- The Alba Firefighters Association will get $45,000 to buy five air packs
and a thermal imaging camera.

- Two of the projects in Grand Traverse County include $30,000 to fund the
River Care program and $15,000 toward entertainment costs at the Women's
Resource Center annual fund-raiser.

- Leelanau County's sheriff's department will get $15,750 to install video
cameras in patrol units.

- Elk Rapids village police will get $21,898 for a mobile speed monitor and
two in-car video cameras.

- Helena Township in Antrim County will get about $25,000 for renovations to
the Alden Harbor.


Copyright © The Traverse City Record-Eagle. All rights reserved.
{ref: MICHIGAN }
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23 Date: 2001-02-08 17:52:52
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Date: Thu, 8 Feb 2001 05:57:49 -0800

West Virginia Town Hopes to Reclaim 600 American Indian Bodies/Reburial
sought for remains sitting in Ohio State lab


By: FRANCIS X. CLINES,
'New York Times' / Thursday, February 8, 2001
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2001/02/08/M

N189824.DTL

BUFFALO, W.Va. -- "Thirty-five years after 600 American Indian graves were
opened and the bodies packed off to a university in the name of science,
this small riverfront town is attempting to reclaim and rebury the bodies in
the name of sacred obligation.
Under a repatriation proposal, the bodies, stored in plastic bags at Ohio
State University, would be reinterred here in dedicated tribal ground.
Far from controversial, the plan has been endorsed by town leaders and
descendants of various Indian communities that found refuge and anonymity in
the back hills of West Virginia after the conquering American government
ordered most Indians to move west of the Mississippi.
"This is not an Indian issue -- it's a human being issue," Maggie Crawford,
a resident of mixed white and Nanticoke blood, said as she roamed across the
snow and corn stipple of a 50-acre farm field beside the Kanawha River. This
serene spot was where the bodies were discovered and removed in a 1960s
excavation that had gone largely forgotten until recently, when the town
began considering a port development plan.
"These people need to go back into their ground," said Crawford, who visited
the remains recently at Ohio State in Columbus with her husband, Basil,
who claims Cherokee blood. "This storage concept has got to stop."
The Crawfords left earth and corn from the Buffalo tract in a gourd on top
of the acid-resistant cardboard boxes containing the bodies. "It's amazing
to see: The boxes line the laboratory walls three deep and 8 feet high,"
Basil Crawford declared, as if he had visited some eerie outpost of limbo.
But he praised the care taken by the university across the decades.
"We've been watching over them," said Dr. Paul W. Sciulli, the university
anthropologist in charge, who emphasized no elaborate tests had been
performed on the remains in the intervening years. "I'd like to see them
protected more than anything else." He endorses the Buffalo repatriation but
with the hope that a discreet process can be worked out so that qualified
scientists retain some access to the remains for legitimate purposes.
"There's a long proto-history with a lot of blanks to be filled in," he
said, noting that the first recorded history in the Ohio Valley region did
not occur until 1750, when French explorers came through. "These remains are
valuable in the search to find out what happened and fill those gaps." Given
the valley's early tribal cultures, fresh scientific techniques might
uncover valuable insights, he added.
The bodies date from the Fort Ancient people of the 1600s and earlier, a
heyday of river trading tribes, before European settlers overtook them. The
remains make up one of the largest such collections in what has been a long-
running, continent-wide grievance for American Indians. It touches on the
problem of Indian cemetery desecration in the face of increasing rural land
development as well as on the needs of science in studying remains and
artifacts to establish vital facts of American prehistory.
The 10-year-old Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of
the federal government has been credited with gradual progress on this
highly sensitive issue, with museum and tribal leaders seeking areas of
agreement over the basic questions of who can rightfully claim Indian
remains and artifacts and who determines their educational value for
succeeding generations. But the law does not pertain to West Virginia, which
has no federally recognized tribes. Buffalo residents, however, are seeking
the act's protection by soliciting the sponsorship of such tribes with past
ties to the area. The local proposal already has been blessed by the eastern
band of Cherokee in North Carolina and the Shawnees of Oklahoma.
"We will honor your traditions with the same respect we wish to honor your
ancestors," Buffalo Mayor Bill Whittington assured the tribes in a letter
endorsed by Mark Harris, chairman of the local historical society, and
Maggie Crawford. The unusual proposal from this town of 1,042 residents
would, in effect, help atone for a centuries-old practice in which numerous
Indian grave sites here in the rich river trade routes were simply pushed
into the river as developers claimed the land, local residents say. Some
tell of old bones routinely discovered along the shore, and many residents
grew up innocently collecting arrowheads and other artifacts, which are
still rife in the old Indian country that extends for miles along the river.
"I was a 10-year-old kid when they opened the Indian graves, and I remember
we all went down to watch," said Leah Higgenbothal, a teacher at the Buffalo
Elementary School. She enthusiastically joined the repatriation drive
started by the Crawfords two years ago when they first learned of Indian
bodies having been removed in the mid-1960s in an industrial development
test that turned into an archaeological dig. "I remember as a girl watching
and wondering why they were taken away," Higgenbothal said. "And now people
I talk to in town think this proposal really should happen. I mean, these
remains are our people,
in a sense. They lived here just like us for hundreds of years. They should
be reburied here with us."
The town proposal hinges in part on a donation of the old burial acreage by
the current owner, the American Electric Power Co. The utility's initial
reaction has been positive, said Jeri Matheny, a company spokeswoman. "We
feel pretty good about the process so far and hope to satisfy everyone
involved," Matheny said. "But it's important to make sure we know all the
details of the issues involved before a final decision."
Currently, the Army Corps of Engineers is conducting a feasibility study of
the town's tentative plan to build a new port on land adjacent to the
proposed burial tract. Whether the port goes forward or not, the town and
the historical society want the repatriation to be completed and to include
an educational center at the site that they would run in conjunction with
tribal sponsors."

©2001 San Francisco Chronicle Page C2
{ref: OHIO WEST VIRGINIA NAGPRA }


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doctrine of international copyright law.


22 Date: 2001-02-08 17:50:56
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Reno sues Truckee sanitation agency

By DARIN OLDE,
Sierra Sun
http://www.tahoe.com/sun/stories.2.8.01/NEWS/newssuit08Feb2590.html

In an effort to protect Pyramid Lake and the Truckee River, the City of Reno,
the City of Sparks and the Pyramid Lake Paiute tribe have filed suit to halt
approval of $42 million in expansion plans for the Tahoe-Truckee Sanitation
Agency's water reclamation plant, an action that could stall future growth
for the entire North Shore.

The suit, filed Jan. 19 in Nevada County Superior Court, alleges the
sanitation agency and the board of directors failed to comply with the
California Environmental Quality Act by approving an environmental impact
report despite unresolved impacts on the Truckee River and Pyramid Lake.

Tahoe-Truckee Sanitation Agency officials, however, say they have complied
with California water quality standards, and that any deterioration in water
quality occurs after the water crosses the state line into Nevada.

Utility officials and area planners say the water reclamation expansion plan
is critical to the economic future of the region.

With the number of major developments taking place in Truckee, Martis Valley
and Olympic Valley, delaying plant expansion and suspending new sewer permits
could bring developments across North Lake Tahoe to a standstill.

The water reclamation plant, which serves five North Shore sewer collection
districts, including Truckee Sanitation District, North Tahoe Public Utility
District and Tahoe City Public Utility District, treats up to 7.4 million
gallons of wastewater per week.

The reclamation plant reached 80 percent of its capacity two years ago,
according to Tahoe-Truckee Sanitation Agency General Manager Craig Woods.

Woods then approached the board of directors with the possibility of engaging
in an expansion study, which the board approved. The study, which took two to
three years to complete and cost approximately $1 million, was approved by
the board Dec. 19, 2000.

"Reno, Sparks and the Pyramid Lake Paiute tribe on the last day of the last
hour opposed the environmental documents we submitted for the plant
expansion," said Woods. He added that the agency has always prided itself on
superb water quality standards. "We have never had a significant water
quality violation."

Woods said the lawsuit raises three primary concerns: limited water
allocations, a possible $15 million financial impact on existing customers
and the financial impact on new developments in the North Tahoe region.

"The state of California has negotiated water allocations through the Truckee
River Operating Agreement. Now we may not receive those allocations," he
said. "It appears the downstream water interests are attempting to prevent
California's use of this water supply, and - and this is my opinion - that
other interests were not negotiated in good faith."

Woods said that the cities of Reno and Sparks and the Pyramid Lake Paiute
tribe want the existing technology at the reclamation plant to be replaced
with technology that could cost up to $15 million, bringing the total project
cost to $57 million.

Currently, the cost for a sewer permit from the sanitation agency is
approximately $4,000, but that could rise with these new costs.

"If downstream interests are successful, that cost would increase
significantly," Woods said.

Reno, Sparks and the Pyramid Lake Paiute tribe filed to void the
certification of the environmental impact report, void the sanitation
agency's approval of the project and direct them to prepare a legally
adequate report before any contractual work can begin.

The plaintiffs allege degradation of water quality and water habitats in both
the river and the lake were not addressed, further endangering the Cui-ui and
Lahontan Cutthroat Trout. They also allege the Tahoe-Truckee Sanitation
Agency violates water quality standards in California and Nevada.

"The project would dramatically increase pollutant loadings to the Truckee
River and Pyramid Lake, which are regional and national water bodies of
extreme importance for both water supply, recreation and the maintenance of
significant biological resources," wrote the plaintiffs in their challenge
submitted to the court.

"Generally speaking (the Tahoe-Truckee Sanitation Agency) has had a very good
record complying with their effluent limitations," said Scott Ferguson,
senior water resource control engineer for Lahontan Regional Water Quality
Control Board. "The river did exceed the water quality standards ... for a
brief period in the late '90s," he said, "but I don't think (the sanitation
agency) is solely responsible for that."

Ferguson said the statistical methods for measuring water quality standards
in California are not the same as the methods used in Nevada.

"Theoretically (the sanitation agency) could be compliant with California
standards and out of compliance in Nevada," he said.

Ferguson said differences in the statistical methods is an issue the Lahontan
Regional Water Quality Control Board will need to handle, but it will be
independent of the lawsuit.

"Basically you have three government agencies placing standards on the
Truckee River," he said, referring to California, Nevada and the Paiute tribe.

No dates have been set for legal proceedings, but the sanitation agency
estimates the expansion project will take two years to complete, and hopes to
have the expansion on-line by 2004, when some of the larger developers in the
Tahoe-Truckee area will be forced to seek permits or abandon plans.

"There are sewer permits still available," Woods said, "but there is not
enough for the various known projects which are out there."."

http://www.tahoe.com/



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21 Date: 2001-02-08 17:48:45
Sacred Heart (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Natives gather 'to save our children'
Suicide no longer a forbidden topic as elders meet to share stories, advice

Roy MacGregor
National Post
http://www.nationalpost.com/commentary/columnists/story.html?f=/stories/200102

08/468318.html

THUNDER BAY - The room has been carefully prepared.

Dream catchers near the windows, a special table for the elders, a cleared
circle in the centre for the drummers -- and a jumbo box of Kleenex by the
entrance.

"Be prepared," says volunteer Beverley Fawcett. "We're going to need this
over the next few days."

They have come to this second-floor ballroom of the old Prince Arthur Hotel
from all over Northern Ontario and into Manitoba and Saskatchewan, Crees and
Ojibway from some of the most-isolated, most-gut-wrenching communities in all
of Canada to discuss what was once a forbidden subject, but is today a
necessary one.

Native suicide.

Two years ago, Leonard Bananish, an Ojibway chaplain at the Thunder Bay
District Jail had the idea of bringing particular people into a Gathering
Circle on suicide prevention. Instead of academics, the knowledge would come
from village elders. Instead of psychologists and psychiatrists, the
empirical evidence would come from those who had been to the brink and,
somehow, managed to turn away in another direction.

"I just felt there was something missing," Bananish says. "I wanted to
explore the spiritual aspect of all this -- native spirituality."

The laughing eyes of this big, lumbering man betray his own, deeper reasons.
Five brothers lost already. Fires, accidents, freezing to death ... every one
of them tied directly to alcoholism, how many, he wonders, deliberate?

Two years ago when the call went out, 43 people showed up. Wednesday morning,
when Bananish's second gathering -- called Aandaanmad, "Changing Winds" --
opened with a traditional smudge ceremony, the fire marshal's dictum of "no
more than 225" people in the hotel ballroom was in jeopardy.

The winds are indeed changing. People are beginning to ask aloud how it is
that this remarkable country called Canada could, year in and year out, be
chosen the No. 1 nation in the world for its quality of life -- and yet this
same country could hold a massive, scattered Aboriginal population that live
in Third World conditions.

In recent months the rest of the country has been finally hearing the stories
the small hidden communities have known for decades: Sheshatshiu, Davis Inlet
... not all that far from here little Pikangikum in northeast Manitoba where,
out of a population of only 1,700, 11 people killed themselves last year
alone. Eight of them were female and, of that eight, five were girls, all 13
years of age. The method of choice: hanging. The cold mathematics of it: 36
times the national average for suicides.

British sociologist Colin Samson, who works for Survival International, says
that the Pikangikum First Nation suicide rate may, in fact, be the highest
community rate in the entire world. Suicides on Ontario reserves -- many of
them from the Nishnawbe-Aski Nation that covers much of this area -- reached
an all time high in 2000, making Northern Ontario the most disturbing region
for suicide in all of Canada.

Assembly of First Nations Grand Chief Matthew Coon Come has called on the
government to forge a "national policy" on native suicide.

Nothing, however, has yet been done. The U.K.-based Survival International
says Canada is simply in a state of "massive cultural denial" over this issue
that seems to garner attention only if it involves something so dramatic as
youngsters videotaping themselves on the verge of taking their own troubled
lives.

All day Wednesday, Ojibway and Cree elders took to the microphone to talk to
a packed, warm crowd that would not dare a quick cough or early exit.

Saskatoon's Walter Linklater talked of living with his grandparents' in the
northwestern Ontario bush in the 1940s -- "One thing about the trap line,
there's no alcohol or drugs" -- and being snatched away at age six and sent
off to various residential schools where he was "assimilated and annihilated"
until he had lost his language and no longer had any sense of who he was.

Residential school, he said, forced the children to become totally dependent
on church and school until they had lost all sense of independence. A bright
student, he was earmarked to teach himself and sent out to a rural school
where, within two years, he had become an alcoholic. He lost his teaching
jobs, drifted, and ended up in the streets of this same city until one day in
the 1970s he found himself so befuddled that, in heavy fog down by the water,
he says he spent two hours singing Hank Williams' love songs to a stump.

For the last 28 years he has been sober and determined to get other natives
to return to their own beliefs. Working with his wife, Maria, he has brought
healing circles and sweat lodges into the prison system with success and the
two of them, Walter now 61 and Maria 59, have had 350 foster children pass
through their home.

"We have to go back to our culture," says Maria Linklater. "We have to save
our young children."

More militant than her husband, she believes that, "First Nations people have
become an industry" in Canada, and that it can even be argued that certain
people, social workers and bureaucrats "benefit from our suicides." The
residential school may have gone, she says, "but they're still taking away
our children."

Another Elder, Katherine Green of Winnipeg, agreed that the one significant
trait shared by all troubled native youth is a profound sense of not knowing
who they are. Somehow, native identity has been stripped away; somehow it
must be put back, with pride.

She talked about what it is like to be on the front lines of this disturbing
story. A Grade 9 dropout who later became both a registered nurse and a
social worker, she told of finding native children as young as eight and nine
years of age working as prostitutes on the streets of Winnipeg. She spoke of
staying up until four o'clock in the morning to talk down youngsters high on
drugs. She talked about how she cringes when the phone rings and it is a
young voice saying, "Kathy, I'm just not worth it. I want to end my life."

With those calls, however, there is still a chance.

"It's the ones who don't talk about it that most scare you," says Leonard
Bananish. "They're the ones who seem to have everything together -- and then
..."

That, he says, is why these people have come together, to begin talking
openly about something that usually only gets talked about after the fact,
when it is too late.

"You can make a difference," Katherine Green all but shouted to the crowd.
And Leonard Bananish, the jail chaplain, agrees.

"If you're able to do one thing," he says. "If someone, somewhere, gains
something out of this. Then that has to be worth it."

Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.


20 Date: 2001-02-08 17:46:43
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Coal plans stir controversy
By JIM GRANSBERY
Of The Gazette Staff
http://www.billingsgazette.com/index.php?section=local&display=content/local/c

oal.inc

Enthusiasm for added coal mining and construction of a new coal-fired
generating plant in Eastern Montana waxes and wanes depending on where one
lives along the Tongue River.

Upstream, the proposal is seen as sacrificing the needs of agriculture. And
the president of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe said she was concerned about
Gov. Judy Martz’s request for the immediate transfer of the federal Otter
Creek coal tracts to the state of Montana.

In Custer County, two commissioners did not hesitate Wednesday in supporting
the idea of a coal-fired generating plant in their neighborhood.

“It would be wonderful,” said Duane Mathison, Custer County commissioner.
“It would be a godsend. It would greatly reduce the homeowners tax.”

Mathison was responding to news that Martz had asked the new federal
secretary of the interior to quickly transfer 11 sections of federal coal
land near Ashland to the state for the purpose of developing power-generating
facilities.

Now, building an electrical generating plant in southeastern Montana,
possibly in Miles City, “might be a reality, not just talk,” Mathison said.

Commissioner Dan Connors said he also supports the idea, “just on the tax
base. We would be like Rosebud County. The mill value would jump.”

Rosebud County is the home of Colstrip Units 1-4 generating plants, which
increase the taxable value of the county significantly compared to Custer
County next door. Connors said a taxing mill in Custer County is worth
$14,383 compared to Rosebud’s $170,000.

But the proposed development is not a positive for at least one Tongue River
rancher.

Wally McRae, a long-time opponent of the proposed Tongue River Railroad, said
he is tired of agriculture being the “expendable industry.”

“My biggest fear is for the water,” he said.

McRae said he was not convinced large coal-fired energy plants are the answer
to the energy shortage.

“They should build smaller ones run by a diversity of fuels,” he said. “Put
them in declining population areas that have enough population to construct
and operate them. Build four, 50-megawatt plants, not a 200. Not a 350 or
500.”

He said the added coal tracts are “quid pro quo on the part of the governor
for Gustafson.”

Mike Gustafson is president of Wesco Resources of Billings and developer of
the Tongue River Railroad, which would haul coal in the area. He was one of
the corporate members of the People for Montana, which raised hundreds of
thousands of dollars for independent expenditures in the 2000 governor’s
campaign.

“The lap dog not only barks, she bites,” McRae said.

McRae was referring to Martz’s comment after the election that if her support
for businesses was seen as her being a lapdog of industry, so be it.

Geri Small, president of the Northern Cheyenne Tribe, said she was concerned
about Martz’s request to Secretary of the Interior Gayle Norton for the
“immediate transfer” of the federal coal tracts.

“The Northern Cheyenne Tribe is the largest single population in the vicinity
of Otter Creek and the nearest local government,” Small said. “To the best
of my knowledge, the tribe has never been consulted by the state or the
federal government with respect to the transfer or the governor’s plan to
promote mining in Otter Creek.”

Small, who said her comments were personal opinion because the Tribal Council
had not had adequate time to review the matter, said the tribe’s status as a
sovereign nation mandates that it be provided with adequate notice and
opportunity for input on the transfer.

“I share Gov. Martz’s desire to simulate the stagnant economy in
southeastern Montana,” Small said. “However, the trend regarding coal mining
surrounding our reservation is that the tribe bears the burden of impacts
without realizing any real benefits. I want to insure that this trend does
not continue.”

The Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation’s eastern border is the Tongue
River. The Otter Creek tracts are directly east.

The federal Otter Creek coal was to be Montana’s payment in the deal that
pre-empted the construction of the New World/Crown Butte gold mine outside
Yellowstone Park. Although the 1998 Interior Appropriations Act outlined the
transfer of the coal tracts, Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt refused
repeated requests by Gov. Marc Racicot that the Otter Creek tracts be turned
over. Instead, Babbitt offered $10 million in federal mineral rights
elsewhere.

In a final letter to Racicot, dated Dec. 22, Babbitt said giving the Otter
Creek tracts to Montana “would open up a rural area to industrial development
and holds the potential for environmental disruption and accompanying
controversy.”

Martz in her Feb. 1 letter to Norton said the Otter Creek tracts contain
significant reserves of super compliant coal in excess of 533 million tons.

“Considering the energy shortage that not only the West is experiencing, but
also the eastern part of the United States, I believe it is in the best
interest of the United States and the state of Montana to immediately
transfer federal ownership,” the governor said.

Copyright © 2001 Associated Press. All rights reserved.
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doctrine of international copyright law.


19 Date: 2001-02-08 17:44:39
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Thursday, February 8, 2001

Indian agencies share $8 million in grants
Compiled from our staff and wire services
http://www.spokesmanreview.com/news-story.asp?date=020801&ID=s918607

The U.S. Justice Department will distribute nearly $8 million in grants to 38
American Indian communities to help curb youth violence and drug abuse.

Eleven tribal governments and agencies in Idaho, Washington, Montana and
Oregon will receive portions of the grant.

The Healing Lodge of the Seven Nations in Spokane will receive $162,317
annually for the next three years. The Healing lodge is a juvenile treatment
center with 30 beds that serves primarily Native Americans. The center is
owned and operated by regional tribes: the Coeur d'Alene, Spokane, Kalispel,
Colville, Kootenai of Idaho, Umatilla and Nez Perce.

The Nez Perce tribe will get $100,000 to establish a restitution program for
youth offenders that incorporates community work at powwows and basketball
tournaments, as well as hunting, fishing and root digging.

The Kalispel Tribe will receive $73,352 to provide case management, drug and
alcohol education and juvenile counseling.



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[ Edit | View ]

News and Issues -- Anonymous, 09:20:08 03/12/01 Mon

Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

"Protesters near West Yellowstone foiled an attempt Wednesday to haze bison
into Yellowstone National Park, a Montana Department of Livestock
spokeswoman said.
Between 14 and 18 bison were outside the park, Karen Cooper said, with most
of them along the Madison River north of West Yellowstone.
The attempt to chase them into the park failed "mostly because Buffalo Field
Campaign had hazed them back into the heavy timber," where they couldn't be
chased any further, Cooper said.
Just one animal was hazed back into the park.
Nobody was arrested in Wednesday's operation, which included DOL, the U.S.
Forest Service, the National Park Service, Montana Department of Fish,
Wildlife and Parks, the Montana Highway Patrol and the Gallatin County
sheriff's office.
Buffalo Field Campaign has for the past three winters been interfering with
DOL efforts to haze, capture or shoot bison that leave the park.
In a press release, BFC said nothing about its members hazing bison,
maintaining only that the animals "outsmarted" DOL.
There has been relatively little bison activity so far this winter, as light
snowpack in the park has allowed the animals to remain there.
In past winters, hundreds of animals have been killed."

©2001 Bozeman Chronicle
{ref: BUFFALO FOLKS }

Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.


17 Date: 2001-02-08 17:39:12
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

5 Drug Makers Use Material With Possible Mad Cow Link

By MELODY PETERSEN and GREG WINTER
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/08/health/08COW.html?printpage=yes

For the last eight years, the Food and Drug Administration has repeatedly
asked pharmaceutical companies not to use materials from cattle raised in
countries where there is a risk of mad cow disease.

But regulators discovered last year that five companies, including some of
the world's largest drug concerns, were still using ingredients from those
countries to make nine widely used vaccines.

Some of the companies say that they found the F.D.A.'s request unclear and do
not believe they did anything wrong. Others say they could not keep up with
the government's expanding list of countries where cattle could be infected.
One, however, acknowledged that it could have moved more quickly.

The nine vaccines include some regularly given to millions of American
children, including common vaccines to prevent polio, diphtheria and tetanus.
They also include the anthrax vaccine, which the government requires for
soldiers serving in the Persian Gulf.

Federal health officials stress that the vaccines are still considered safe.
They calculate that the odds of these vaccines passing on the disease, in the
worst eventualities, are between one in 40 million and one in 40 billion
doses.

The officials say that the very slight chance that someone could be infected
is far outweighed by the benefits that these vaccines bring in fighting
disease and preventing death. Indeed, it is now only a scientific theory that
a vaccine could infect someone with the human form of mad cow disease —
called new variant Creutzfeldt- Jakob disease. No one is known to have
contracted the disease this way.

"Any risk is very remote," said Dr. Karen Midthune, director of the F.D.A.'s
Office of Vaccine Research and Review. "But if we have the ability to bring
this remote risk to zero, that is something we want to do."

Nonetheless, the fact that these suspect materials slipped into the nation's
vaccine supply — and that the F.D.A. did not discover it for seven years —
raises questions about the agency's ability to ensure that all medicines are
free of the infectious proteins that can cause mad cow disease.

The F.D.A. so far has only investigated the vaccine makers and has not looked
to see whether other medicine is free of possible mad cow contaminants. Some
experts say they worry more about dietary supplements. Unlike drugs,
supplements are largely unregulated. The F.D.A. is not even sure how many
supplement makers there are.

"It's just insane not to have greater safeguards" for supplements, said Dr.
Paul W. Brown, chairman of the F.D.A.'s advisory committee on mad cow
disease. "The potential exists for abuse."

All five vaccine makers, which include GlaxoSmithKline, Aventis and American
Home Products, have now agreed to stop using the suspect materials, which
include blood, fetal calf serum and meat broth.

But it will take a year or more to replace existing supplies with
reformulated products, because it can take many months to grow cultures used
in making vaccines. Both the companies and the F.D.A. say that the current
products are safe and should remain on pharmacy shelves.

They point out that the suspect ingredients, for the most part, are used only
in the early stages of manufacturing, when cultures are grown. Blood, for
instance, may be used to feed the bacteria and viruses in these cultures. The
cultures are then significantly diluted in the final vaccine.

The F.D.A. first asked the vaccine makers in a 1993 letter to stop using
materials from cattle raised in Britain and other countries where there was a
threat of mad cow disease. Regulators followed up with another letter in 1996
in which the agency "strongly" recommended that drug companies take
"immediate and concrete steps" to make sure they were not using the materials.

In interviews, regulators said it was not until last year that they learned
that some vaccine makers were not complying. During a routine review of a
company's application for a license, the F.D.A. discovered that the company,
which it will not identify, was using cattle parts from a high-risk country.

Regulators immediately demanded that all vaccine makers identify where their
biologic ingredients were coming from. That review found the nine vaccines.

Dr. Murray M. Lumpkin, a senior medical adviser at the F.D.A., said his
agency's investigative resources were limited.

"You have to prioritize where the greater risk is," Dr. Lumpkin said. For
example, the F.D.A. now has inspectors visiting animal feed companies, he
said, after it found that many of them were not following regulations adopted
in 1997. Those rules, in part, prohibit using beef parts to make cattle feed.
Scientists contend that cattle in Britain were infected after eating feed
that contained parts of other infected cows.

"That is where we think the greatest risk for Americans is at this time," Dr.
Lumpkin said.

But critics including doctors, scientists and consumer advocates say that the
F.D.A. should have acted more aggressively by ordering, rather than asking,
companies to follow the agency's recommendations.

"The companies acted recklessly because, in part, the F.D.A. failed to
regulate them," said Dr. Peter G. Lurie, another member of the F.D.A's
advisory committee on the disease.

Dr. Lurie, a researcher at Public Citizen, the consumer group, said he agreed
that the vaccines should stay on pharmacy shelves. But he faulted both the
companies and the F.D.A. for possibly undermining public confidence in the
safety of vaccines.

In their defense, F.D.A. officials said they expected companies to heed their
requests.

"The expectation," Dr. Lumpkin said, "is that people will behave responsibly."

Mad cow disease, which is always fatal, is believed to be caused by an
infectious protein called a prion. In sick animals or humans, the prion
twists into an abnormal shape, often in the brain. These misfolded prions
accumulate in toxic clumps, eventually destroying normal brain tissue and
creating spongelike holes.

Cattle ingredients are used in a myriad of drugs other than vaccines. But the
F.D.A. says it cannot release a list of these drugs because many details of
how a product is manufactured are proprietary corporate information.

But regulators say, for instance, that many drugs contain gelatin, made from
the bones or hooves of cattle. And calf lungs are used to make surfactants,
which help premature infants breathe.

As for dietary supplements, the industry's trade groups say that hundreds of
products use an array of cow tissues, from ground prostate glands and
testicles in pills that supposedly bolster sexual vitality to thymus extract
for healthy skin.

Many organs that scientists consider particularly risky for the transmission
of mad cow disease are also used, including freeze-dried brain and pituitary
glands in supplements that manufacturers say stimulate memory, adrenal
extract for energy, even powdered spleen to help clear the sinuses.

As with vaccines, the F.D.A. has urged supplement makers not to use cow
tissue from certain countries. But the F.D.A., which has no specific
manufacturing rules for supplements, cannot say whether products sold in the
United States are free of such ingredients.



16 Date: 2001-02-08 17:37:08
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Con't from Part 1- 5 Drug Makers Use Material With Possible Mad Cow

"The F.D.A. is toothless," Dr. Brown said. "Their purview over dietary
supplements is infinitesimally small."

Without comprehensive federal guidelines, the Natural Nutritional Foods
Association, the largest trade group, started a voluntary program in 1999 to
test whether its members' products are free of contaminants, including mad
cow disease. But of about 500 companies eligible, only 20 have gone through
the review.

For its part, the F.D.A. inspects only about 60 of the more than 1,000
supplement manufacturers each year. "We rely on the industry to do the right
thing," said Dr. Christine Lewis, director of the F.D.A.'s dietary supplement
division.

In 1995, the F.D.A. told its border agents to detain any imports of suspect
cattle parts or products made from them. Regulators say they have not found
any supplements sold in the United States that contain the materials.

And one industry executive said there was little incentive to even try to
import such materials. "These glands are not very expensive," said Matt
Schueller, vice president at Enzymatic Therapy, a supplement maker in Green
Bay, Wis.

Even so, Dr. Brown and others say that the border controls are not enough.

Every year, more than $1 billion of supplements are imported from high-risk
countries, according to a 1999 F.D.A. study. Only about 7 percent of these
products say on their labels that they contain animal parts, but there could
be more, Dr. Brown said. Foreign labeling laws vary widely, he said, making
it hard to know what some imports contain.

The companies that make the nine vaccines say they have tried to comply with
the F.D.A.'s requests and, over the years, have provided regulators with any
information they asked for.

They say that in most of the vaccines, the ingredients that regulators have
questioned are in the cultures used to start each batch. They say that some
of these cultures, which are used year after year, were created in the
1980's, before the F.D.A. told them to stop using material from certain
countries.

American Home Products has been working for five years to change the material
used in bacterial seed cultures for its vaccine, Pnu- Imune 23, which
prevents pneumonia, said Dr. Peter R. Paradiso, a top researcher in the
company's Lederle Vaccine subsidiary. The 23 cultures making up the vaccine
must be modified one at a time, he said, with regulators approving each one.

"The risk is very, very minuscule," Dr. Paradiso said. He calculates the risk
of Pnu-Imune passing on the disease, in a worst case situation, at one in 2.4
trillion doses.

At Aventis, Len Lavenda, a spokesman, said that the company had believed that
IPOL, its polio vaccine, complied with the F.D.A.'s request. But last year,
regulators disagreed, he said, because the company cannot trace the origin of
some ingredients purchased in the 1980's.

In ActHIB, Aventis's vaccine to protect against haemophilus influenzae Type B
bacterium, the company used small amounts of hemin, a blood derivative, from
cattle in the Netherlands. Material from the Netherlands was banned in 1997,
but Aventis decided not to change its supplier, he said, because its
scientists believed that infectious material could not survive the production
process.

"That was probably a mistake," Mr. Lavenda said. The vaccines are safe, he
said, but the company fears its decision could weaken the public's confidence
in the vaccines.

BioPort, which makes vaccines against rabies and anthrax, said that it did
not understand until last year that the F.D.A. wanted the companies to change
seed cultures created before 1993.

GlaxoSmithKline, the British pharmaceutical giant that sells three of the
vaccines cited by the F.D.A., declined to answer specific questions. Carmel
M. Hogan, a company spokeswoman, said the company had been trying since 1990
"to move away from using bovine materials from infected countries."

The F.D.A. said the problem with Infanrix, one of GlaxoSmithKline's vaccines,
which prevents diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis, stems from an ingredient
made for it by Chiron Behring in Germany. Chiron stopped using material from
German cows in September, said Thomas Schick, a Chiron spokesman, after
American regulators visited its factory.

The final vaccine, Certiva, also for children, was made by North American
Vaccines until 1999 when there were production problems. Baxter
International, which purchased North American last year, said the company did
not intend to sell Certiva again.

Copyright 2001 The New York Times Company
{ref: HEALTH }

RELATED ARTICLE:
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/08/health/08CONS.html

The Vaccines in Question

An outside committee of health experts and federal regulators has reviewed
the risk of contracting the human equivalent of mad cow disease from several
vaccines and has concluded that the risk is remote and only theoretical. No
one is known to have been infected by a vaccine. The United States Public
Health Service said in December that all people should continue to be
vaccinated. The service said there was no need to select one vaccine over
another.

The Food and Drug Administration calculates that at the worst the risk of
contracting the disease from one dose of a bacterial vaccine, such as a
vaccine to protect against tetanus, is one in 40 million.

And with viral vaccines, like the one against polio, the F.D.A. estimates
that the risk is far lower — no more than one in 40 billion.

More information is available on the Web at www.fda.gov/cber/bse/bse.htm
.


Here is the list of vaccines that use cattle materials from
countries where the government says there is a risk of mad
cow disease:

• ActHIB, sold by Aventis Pasteur, to prevent infection by
the haemophilus influenzae Type B bacterium.

• OmniHIB, sold by GlaxoSmithKline, to protect against
haemophilus influenzae Type B.

• Infanrix, sold by Glaxo SmithKline, to prevent diphtheria,
tetanus and pertussis.

• Havrix, sold by GlaxoSmithKline, to prevent hepatitis A.

• Certiva, sold by North American Vaccine, now a unit of
Baxter International, to prevent diphtheria, tetanus and
pertussis.

Vaccines that use cattle materials of unknown geographic
origin are:

• IPOL, sold by Aventis Pasteur, to prevent polio.

• Pnu-Imune 23, sold by American Home Products'
Lederle Laboratories, to prevent pneumococcal diseases.

• Anthrax vaccine, sold by BioPort.

• Rabies vaccine, sold by BioPort.
}
Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.


15 Date: 2001-02-08 17:33:58
Advocate Investigator (no email / no homepage) wrote:

By: MEG McSHERRY BRESLIN
'Chicago Tribune' Staff Writer
February 08, 2001
http://www.chicago.tribune.com/vweaion1/article/0,1575,SAV-0102080312,00.html

"The United Methodist Church jumped into the increasingly heated debate over
the University of Illinois' Chief Illiniwek this week by announcing a
$10,000 grant to a group trying to rid the campus of the sports team symbol.
The church's General Commission on Religion and Race awarded the funds to
the Illinois chapter of the National Coalition on Racism in Sports and
Media.
The group is one of the most vocal opponents of the beleaguered chief,
arguing that the mascot is racist and offensive to Native Americans.
And although the commission has received more than a dozen phone calls in
recent days criticizing the donation, many from loyal alumni and supporters
of the university mascot, church officials said they stand by their
decision.
"What [the callers] don't realize is that this hurts Native American young
people. It destroys their self-esteem because they're not mascots, they're
human beings," said Ken Deere, associate general secretary of the
commission.
The Methodist grant, to be used to help sponsor educational forums on the
chief in the local community, is the largest and most significant donation
the Illinois chapter of the racism coalition has received from a religious
organization, said Cyd Crue, chapter president.
The financial support the Champaign-based group got before was mostly small
sums to help sponsor conferences or assist with printing costs. Crue said he
hopes the grant sends a message to the U. of I. board of trustees, which
recently held a public forum on the chief in response to mounting criticism.
"I think the money and the fact that religious leaders are getting involved
will help them realize this is a moral and ethical issue," said Crue, who
lives in Champaign and has a son who is Native American. "I think the
problem is they have not looked within their souls about this. They have not
even tried to understand what native people are talking about."
The mascot--a 75-year-old university tradition--has been under debate for
more than a decade. It is represented by a student who paints his face,
wears a costume and headdress from the Oglala Lakota Sioux tribe, and dances
at halftime shows at varsity football and basketball games.
While opponents argue the mascot is degrading to Native Americans,
supporters say it is a source of university pride.
Partly in response to a university accreditation team that recommended the
university's board of trustees directly address concerns raised about the
chief, the board held a public forum last spring and solicited comments from
alumni and the community.
A 70-page report was recently compiled by former Cook County Judge Louis
Garippo.
Board members are expected to respond to that report at a March 7 board
meeting but have not said whether they will vote on the issue.
Board Chairman William Engelbrecht said the Methodists' position will weigh
no more heavily on board members than any other group.
"Remember that we are evaluating the comments of nearly 18,000 entities on
this issue, some of them individuals and some of them organizations," he
said. "We're certainly not going to get into the business, nor would we want
to, that this church organization is more important than the others."
The church commission, an arm of the national offices of the Methodist
Church, has awarded similar grants for decades to groups fighting racism."

{ref: MASCOT ILLINOIS }
Reprinted under the Fair Use http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
doctrine of international copyright law.


14 Date: 2001-02-08 17:31:22
Advocate Reporter (no email / no homepage) wrote:

> HIV infection rate high in young Americans
> FEBRUARY 7, 2001
>
> Health researchers are sounding warnings on the high
> rate of HIV infections among young Americans,
> especially minorities.
>
> A Centers for Disease Control study reports that about
> 30 percent of African-American males who have sex with
> other males are
> infected with the virus. Among all races, only 30
> percent of the young men infected were aware of their
> status.
>
> Get the Story:
> High HIV Rates Seen in Young (The Washington Post 2/7)
>
>
> Relevant Links:
> The Centers for Disease Control - www.cdc.gov




13 Date: 2001-02-08 14:54:37
Advocate Reporter (no email / no homepage) wrote:

'Chiapas' bank robber caught
FEBRUARY 8, 2001

A New Mexico man who said he was robbing banks to help Zapatista rebels in Mexico was captured by FBI agents on
Wednesday.

Byron Shane Chubbuck aka "Robin the Hood" was shot in the chest by an FBI agent and was listed in satisfactory
condition at University of New Mexico Hospital. Chubbock on December 21 escaped from a prisoner transport van and
has been accused of robbing eight banks in the Albuquerque area.

Authorities said Chubbock called in to a local radio station and told a DJ that he was robbing the banks to help the
Indian rights rebels in Mexico. The radio station aired the interview on Monday.

"I was robbing banks to help the Zapatistas in Chiapas, Mexico," said the caller, whom the FBI identified as Chubbock.



12 Date: 2001-02-08 14:52:08
Advocate Reporter (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Ashcroft says teens, women priorities
FEBRUARY 8, 2001

Recently confirmed Attorney General John Ashcroft on Wednesday laid
out his priorities at the Department of Justice
and said teen drug use and battling discrimination against women and
minorities were top priorities.

In an agenda laid out to staffers and an appearance on CNN's "Larry
King Live," Ashcroft began reaching out to
Democrats and others who have criticized him on his record.

Teen drug use and violence against women are two of the major issues
facing Indian Country.

Get the Story:
Violence, Teen Drug Use Are Ashcroft Priorities (The Washington Post
2/8)



11 Date: 2001-02-08 14:49:43
Advocate Reporter (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Could Peltier have been set free?
FEBRUARY 8, 2001

Imprisoned activist Leonard Peltier might have received executive
clemency had he friends in high places. Or, at least
a bigger wallet.

Access to President Bill Clinton, according to critics of his final
pardons and commutations, might have ensured Peltier
his own favorable decision. Personal friends of pardoned felons, or
alleged ones, like commodities trader Marc Rich and
Whitewater partner Susan McDougal are said to have been instrumental
in the process.

The House Committee on Government Reform is holding a hearing on
Rich's controversial pardon today. Attorney
General John Ashcroft criticized Clinton for pardoning Rich on CNN's
"Larry King Live" last night.

Get the Story:
Access to the White House Opened Door to Clemency (The Washington Post
2/8)
House panel to begin investigation of Rich pardon (AP 2/8)
Ashcroft hits Clinton on pardon, drug war (AP 2/8)

Relevant Links:
Free Leonard Peltier - www.freepeltier.org
The Leonard Peltier File, FBI -
www.fbi.gov/contact/fo/minn/peltier.htm
The No Parole Peltier Association - www.noparolepeltier.com



10 Date: 2001-02-08 14:47:20
Advocate Reporter (N_A_Advocate@mindspring.com / no homepage) wrote:

Report tackles economid development
FEBRUARY 8, 2001

A report released on Wednesday tackles the subject of economic
development in Indian Country, hoping to explain
why entrepreneurial activity on reservations is much lower than the
rest of the country.

In "Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) 2000 National
Entrepreneurship Assessment for the United States of
America," researchers from Babson College in Massachusetts and the
Kauffman Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership
in New York examine some of the complex issues faced by more than 550
tribes in the nation. They cite a number of
obstacles face Native Americans who want to start their own economic
ventures on reservations.

One obstacle is already well-known in Indian Country. While tribal
governments can be an ally in expanding economic
opportunities through gaming and other developments, they can also be
a hindrance, especially when it comes to daily
operation of businesses.

The Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska has been recognized nationally for
developing its own solution to the issue. Its
economic development corporation, Ho-Chunk Inc., has kept tribal
politics separate from business decisions although
CEO Lance Morgan, a tribal member, says the two can occasionally
collide.

But different factors can affect economic development activity taken
on by tribes as opposed to ventures started by
individual tribal members. Individuals who operate businesses on
allotted or trust land don't necessarily face the same
governance issues a tribally-owned corporation like Ho-Chunk Inc.
might face.

Still, the report does cite other problems shared by tribes and
individuals alike. Poor water and electrical systems,
substandard housing, inadequate road and transportation systems, and
deficient communications networks can hinder
successful entrepreneurial activity.

The report also says Indian culture can hinder some economic
development. While the researchers say most Americans
disagree with the notion that everyone should have the same standard
of living, they say tribal cultures place more
value on community well-being than personal independence.

"Social norms strongly influence the prevalence, or lack thereof, of
start-ups among Native Americans," said Andrew
Zacharakis, a Babson College researcher. "Whereas the U.S. as a whole
can be considered individualistic with a
propensity for independence, Native Americans are more
community-oriented."

Zacharakis and the other researchers say improvements in education,
especially in early grades, is key to ensuring
young Native Americans grow up with an "entrepreneurial mentality."
They also say successful Native American
entrepreneurs need to become role models to show others in their
communities how to kick-start economic
development.

"What's important to note is Native Americans across the country are
working hard to begin the effort to build
entrepreneurial economies in their communities," said S. Michael Camp,
project director and director of research at the
Kauffman Center. "Now it's just a matter of time before we see
substantial improvements."



9 Date: 2001-02-08 14:44:38
Sacred Heart (no email / no homepage) wrote:

Campbell criticized for radio talk
FEBRUARY 8, 2001

Colorado Republican Ben Nighthorse Campbell, the Senate's only Native
American member, took the radio waves on
Wednesday but not everyone was happy with his performance.

Appearing on the nationally broadcast program Native America Calling,
Campbell was set to participate in a one-hour
question and answer session with host Harlan McKosato and interested
callers from throughout the country. However,
the Northern Cheyenne tribal member departed halfway through the
program due to another scheduled meeting.

Still, his half-hour stint was not without some heated exchanges. Guy
Lopez, one of several Indian leaders who called
on the Senate to reject Gale Norton's confirmation as Secretary of
Interior, questioned Campbell's support of the
controversial Cabinet member.

During her nine-year tenure as Colorado's Attorney General, Norton
signed several legal briefs asking the Supreme
Court to set limits on tribal sovereignty. But Campbell discounted the
idea that Norton was anti-tribal and said she
was merely working at the "directive of the Governor."

"You're wrong, its as simple as that," Campbell told Lopez. "The
bottom line is her record is good from my perspective
and I'm glad she's in there."

"I've got a full plate back here and I don't need to get into
arguments over the air with someone who knows her record
like I do," a seemingly agitated Campbell added.

Lopez, executive director of the Indigenous Peoples' Endangered
Species Program at the Center for Biological Diversity,
didn't appear fazed by Campbell's remarks, though. After the show, the
Crow Creek Sioux tribal member said Campbell
is ignoring the "well-documented, anti-Indian record of Gale Norton"
and hoped he would keep in mind issues raised by
himself and others.

Cinda Hughes, a staff member in the Oklahoma Senate, was less
optimistic. After Campbell departed the program,
Hughes said she was "very disturbed" about his conversation with
Lopez.

"It was indicative of his arrogance and indicative of his
unwillingness to listen to any other opinion that he has," said
Hughes, a member of the Kiowa Tribe of Oklahoma. "That probably is how
he got so far amongst the Caucasians in
Washington, DC."

Besides defending Norton, Campbell yesterday said President George W.
Bush supports tribal sovereignty. Tribal
leaders have been skeptical of Bush ever since he suggested that
state's rights "reign supreme" when it comes to
tribes but Campbell said those remarks had been taken out of context.

Campbell also addressed another hot topic on the show. The sponsor of
a bill that would rid the Bureau of Indian
Affairs of its federal recognition, Campbell said other Senators have
jumped into the debate in response to
"disgruntled" citizens who are "angry" that tribes, like the
Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation of Connecticut, have
become wealthy due to gaming.

"I had one of my Ute friends tell me once: 'You know, those
non-Indians liked us better when we were poor,'"
recounted Campbell. "That may be true. There might be people up the
road in Connecticut who are just jealous or
something."

Relevant Links:
Native America Calling - www.nativecalling.org
Stop Gale Norton - www.biologicaldiversity.org/swcbd/
stop-norton/index.html


[ Edit | View ]

News and Issues -- Anonymous, 09:16:51 03/12/01 Mon

Leonard's Supporters (no email / no homepage) wrote:

> STATEMENT BY LEONARD PELTIER
>
>
> Greetings Friends and Supporters:
>
> January 20, 2001, was a sad day for all of us. I know that this denial of
> clemency has affected many of you as much as it has affected both my
family
> and myself. It is a terrible feeling and disappointment knowing that this
> nightmare has not ended and will continue for many months to come.
>
> When I received the news, I felt my stomach curl and a feeling of nausea
> rolled over me. It took a while for me to refocus. For some reason I had
> thought I might be having dinner with my family that night. It was an
> especially disappointing day for all of us.
>
> What Bill Clinton did to us was cruel. For eight years he ignored my
> clemency petition despite the major campaign that was waged. Then, just
> months before leaving office he publicly promised to make a decision on my
> case, one way or the other. He said he was aware of its importance. The
> White House gave my attorneys indications that there was a good chance for
> my clemency to be granted. I had to prepare myself for being released
> because there was no sign that my petition would be denied.
>
> The LPDC bought me clothes, my grandson prepared his bedroom for me to
sleep
> in and other preparations were made for my homecoming. My friends on Pine
> Ridge began plans to build me a house. We were literally forced to get
our
> hopes up because we did not want to be unprepared if I was suddenly set
> free.
>
> January 19, came and still, they kept us in nervous anticipation saying
the
> more difficult clemencies are still being worked on and would be announced
> the next morning. Then January 20 came and went! The White House never
> even told us what the decision was. We had to find out through the press
> that my name was not on the list of clemencies. To leave a person's life
> and so many peoples' hopes hanging in the balance like that is truly
> hardhearted.
>
> Since that dark Saturday, I have managed to get up and dust myself off,
and
> begin to lift my spirits once more. I am just as determined now to fight
> for my freedom as I was on February 6, 1976 when I was first arrested. I
> will not give up. This is the second time in the span of my incarceration
> that I made it to the top of the hill and saw that freedom was in view,
only
> to be kicked right back down to the bottom again.
>
> The first time was in 1985, when the evidence used to convict me was
> impeached and I was denied a new trial, despite Judge Heaney's finding
that
> I might have been acquitted had the jury been presented this evidence. To
> be denied a new trial after such a finding shocked our network and me just
> as much as this denial of clemency has. However, we never lose a battle
> without making some major gains in the overall struggle.
>
> I want to compliment and thank my staff at the LPDC and all of you
> grassroots supporters who stood beside me and fought so tirelessly for my
> freedom. You put on one of the strongest and most memorable campaigns I
> have experienced. Years from now people will read about the
accomplishments
> you made. People from every walk of life worked on this campaign. People
> from every denomination and belief prayed from every corner of the Earth.
> Although it feels like our sentiments were shooed away like an irritating
> fly by a president who did not want to face the consequences of his own
> mistakes, I believe we put up a serious challenge. We can see who was
> granted clemency and why. The big donors to the President's campaign were
> able to buy justice, something we just couldn't afford. Meanwhile, many
> political prisoners continue to languish unjustly, proof that this
nation's
> talk about reconciliation is nothing but empty rhetoric.
>
> We now have a number of strategies to continue this struggle for my
freedom.
> These ideas are in the early planning stages. I ask you to remain with us
> while we regroup and develop a thorough plan. We must carefully consider
> every option and make sure the strategies compliment each other in order
to
> have the best effect. The LPDC will release strategies as they are
> developed. Some will be released this week.
>
> I also have my own personal plans. I will continue doing artwork and will
be
> looking at ways to make it more available to the public. I will also be
> working with my friends, Fedelia and Bob Cross, to build a grade school in
> Oglala. Before my clemency was decided, I began to dream of the different
> projects I would like to work on in Pine Ridge if I were free. Now that I
> have been denied, Fedelia and Bob have said they will take the initiative
to
> begin the projects themselves, with my input. Soon, we will be
establishing
> a board and non-profit status.
>
> Bob and Fedelia are schoolteachers and lifetime Oglala residents, and they
> have the land on which to build the school. They have told me of the
> desperate need for an improved school in Oglala. The existing school is
> severely under funded and inadequate and does not provide the kids with
the
> quality education they need and deserve . We have the highest drop out
rate
> of all ethnic groups in the country and part of the reason is the lack of
> stimulating and challenging programs for the youth.
>
> Another idea I would like to develop is building a small recreation center
> for Oglala. As most of you know Native health conditions are also
probably
> the worst in the country. We want to change that, beginning with this
> center. We want the center to have modern exercise equipment, a
> kitchenette, and card tables. As everyone gathers here to socialize, have
> coffee, gossip, and play cards, we can encourage them to try the equipment
> and to begin getting in the habit of exercising and eating healthy foods.
I
> believe it would be a nice place for people to spend time and a good
> incentive for them to get into better physical condition and stop the
trend
> of diabetes on the reservation. The reservation currently has no facility
> like this.
>
> If we are successful in establishing these two services, I believe that
the
> community of Oglala will truly benefit. We will then be able to move on
to
> other projects that will bring people together and raise the quality of
> life. For example, one day I would like to rebuild Jumping Bull Hall so
> that there will be a drug and alcohol free place where people, especially
> youth, can gather. We could set it up for a movie theatre and bring in
video
> games. People can watch movies, hold meetings, have birthday celebrations,
> community meals and dances here. Right now, our youth have no place to go
> to socialize and I believe this facility could help prevent the
hopelessness
> and despair too many of our young people feel. I would hope that word of
> these projects would spread to other reservations and others like Fedelia
> and Bob Cross will be inspired to take on similar ideas which we could
help
> support.
>
> Your ideas, input, and support are welcomed. If you know people who would
> donate supplies (books, wood, cement, hardware, etc), make financial
> contributions, or donate their skills and labor, please get in touch with
> the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee.
>
> In closing, I want to thank you again for your support and ask that you
> stand with us in this struggle. I believe that one day in the near future
> we will succeed. But it can't be done without your support.
>
> In the Spirit of Crazy Horse,
>
> Leonard Peltier
>
>
>
>
> Leonard Peltier Defense Committee
> PO Box 583
> Lawrence, KS 66044
> 785-842-5774
> www.freepeltier.org


7 Date: 2001-02-08 06:39:46
Leonard's Supporters (no email / no homepage) wrote:





Peltier: A Tug-o-War for Freedom
By Ruth Steinberger
As the close of this Presidency draws near, friends and supporters of Leonard Peltier’s have launched a high profile, international campaign to gain clemency for Peltier. Action on behalf of Peltier by President-elect George Bush is unlikely, and supporters have set their sights on this time period to try to gain Peltier’s freedom.

Supporters of the drive to gain freedom for the Native American activist include numerous Tribes, the National Congress of American Indians, Amnesty International, the European Parliament, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Former Attorney General Ramsey Clark, National Lawyers Guild, National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, Vine Deloria, Sherman Alexie, The Rev. Jessie Jackson, Nelson Mandela and many more.

Now serving his 24th year in the Federal Penitentiary at Leavenworth, Kansas, for the shooting deaths of two FBI agents, Jack Coler and Ron Williams, Peltier maintains his innocence in the deaths. Three other adults were indicted in connection with the shootout. Tried a year before Peltier’s trial, they were acquitted on the grounds that they acted in self-defense.

Recently, in an unprecedented move, the FBI placed full-page ads in national newspapers including USA Today, to try to persuade the public that Peltier is guilty and should remain in prison.

On Friday, December 15, 2000, a group of current FBI agents, along with retired agents and families and friends of the slain men, picketed the White House to let President Clinton know their strong opposition to Peltier’s release. Picketers carried posters depicting photos of the slain agents, urging that the President reject calls for clemency by Peltier’s supporters.

A Native American, Joe Killsright Stuntz, was also killed during the shootout of June 26, 1975. His death was never investigated. Given the documented history of violence against the traditional communities, violence that ultimately escalated into the shootout after repeated calls for investigation over the course of many years, the emotional angle used by the FBI remains hollow.

Calling Peltier a, "Cold blooded killer", FBI Special Agent John Sennett, president of the FBI Agents Association, said, "Leonard Peltier is not at all worthy of that kind of consideration."

Earlier, FBI Director Louie Freeh wrote President Clinton strongly urging him to reject clemency for Peltier, stating that clemency would, ‘signal disrespect’ for law enforcement and for the American people.

When contacted by Oklahoma Indian Times, the FBI had no comment on the matter, and referred to the demonstration of Friday, December 15. They referred Oklahoma Indian Times to the Department of Justice, who told Oklahoma Indian Times they had no comment on the matter.

The shootout on June 26, 1975, occurred after lengthy political disputes on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota left numerous people dead and an atmosphere that many describe as a "reign of terror" throughout the reservation. Much of the violence has been attributed to the tribal police force under Tribal Chairman Dick Wilson. The tribal police had allegedly been involved in beatings, disappearances, and the arson of homes and killings of people who opposed Wilson.

Ultimately, the continued violence against those who opposed Wilson would result in a spontaneous occupation of Wounded Knee, South Dakota, by over 300 traditional Lakota along with friends and supporters, to demand full investigation into the situation they faced.

Many of the disputes preceding the occupation of Wounded Knee in 1973 pitted traditional members of the community against supporters of Wilson, who saw potential profit motives in uranium mining and other ventures. Many traditional members felt Wilson’s activities seriously compromised the land as well as traditional values, and those who opposed Wilson were concerned for their safety as the violence directed toward them escalated.

Documentation from that time reveals that the FBI provided arms to Dick Wilson’s ‘Guardians of the Oglala Nation’ (GOONS), contributing to the escalating violence, abuse, deaths and disappearances on the reservation.

Estimates reveal that as many as 20,000 rounds of ammunition were fired into the village during the occupation, yet a negotiator acknowledged that the FBI with Wilson that promised protection from prosecution for his “GOON” s if they violated the law had reached an agreement



6 Date: 2001-02-08 06:32:43
Leonard's Supporters (no email / no homepage) wrote:


Following an agreement reached on April 5, 1973, a Wounded Knee delegation would submit to arrest, post bond and go to Washington, DC, for discussions on the situation. Russell Means, Leonard Crow Dog and Chief Tom Bad Cob traveled to Washington, DC, but once the men arrived there, the government refused to initiate the promised discussions with them.

Opposition to Wilson’s policies came from many residents of the reservation. Ultimately fearful of the continued, unresolved violence, AIM was asked by residents to send members to help protect activists who feared the ever increasing reprisals which now included homes being burned, cars run off the road, drive-by shootings and murders.

In May 1975, a group of AIM members including Peltier arrived at the Jumping Bull Ranch on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation and set up camp there. An FBI memo, dated June 1975, referred to a potential need for military assault forces to deal with AIM members.

Paul DeMain, Owner of News From Indian Country, said, "The original events leading up to Wounded Knee, in 1973, occurred in 1972 with the occupation of the BIA after the Trail of Broken Treaties." DeMain continued, "After Viet Nam, the CIA, US Army, and other federal agencies...were experimenting with the idea you don’t send in US troops to fight the war, and Wounded Knee was a prime example of this. What you do instead is you give all the arms and ammunition to the opposition and you look the other way in the face of civil rights violations. That’s why Leonard was there, the elders wanted protection."

Documentation from that time reveals that the FBI provided arms to Dick Wilson’s ‘Guardians of the Oglala Nation’ (GOONS), contributing to the escalating violence.

On June 26, 1975, the FBI entered the Jumping Bull property, allegedly following a pick up truck that allegedly carried a person suspected of stealing a pair of boots. The ensuing firefight left one AIM member, Joe Stunts, along with Agents Coler and Williams, dead.

Jean Anne Day, a friend of Peltier’s and a member of the Ho-Chunk Nation traveled with Peltier to Pine Ridge during that summer. Day told Oklahoma Indian Times that, "For many people it truly was a reign of terror. Many traditional people could truly not move around freely because of Wilson’s police. Sadly, had the US Government done what was promised following the situation at Wounded Knee in 1973, this never would have occurred." Day referred to the promises for investigations into the wrongdoing, threats and intimidation and killings still occurring when AIM entered the situation in 1975.

Day concluded, "This also needed to include investigation into the allegations of financial fraud and abuse of power...none of this was done."

Peltier fled to Canada. On December 16, 1976, he was extradited back to the US based upon documents that included testimony that was to later prove false and was to have been produced by FBI threats made against the witness, a mentally ill woman named Myrtle Poor Bear.

Poor Bear’s original testimony included statements that she had been Peltier’s girlfriend at the time of the shootout and that she witnessed the events of June 26, 1975. Ultimately, she explained that her testimony was produced under threats made against her by FBI agents. Poor Bear then explained that she never knew Peltier personally, and that she was not present at the Jumping Bull Ranch during the shootout. Though Poor Bear’s testimony against Peltier was used to extradite him, she was not permitted to testify in court later that she had given that testimony under threats.

In March 1977, Peltier’s trial began in Fargo, ND. The trial was riddled with contradictions, testimony was not allowed in which two witnesses stated that their testimony had been coerced by threats from FBI agents.

The presiding Judge was changed, so that the Judge who heard the original trial a year earlier that ended in acquittal would not preside over Peltier’s trial. From the outset, Judge Benson ruled that evidence would be limited to the events of June 26, 1975, leaving out the historical violence at Pine Ridge leading up to the shootout, as well as excluding important information from the earlier trial that resulted in acquittal of Peltier’s original codefendants. This prevented the defense from bringing up glaring inconsistencies in testimony that was offered in the two trials.

In 1981 extensive documents released through the Freedom of Information Act revealed information that cast serious doubts concerning Peltier’s guilt, and which also revealed very serious flaws in the way the case against Peltier was pursued.

During Peltier’s trial, the FBI ballistics expert stated that the rifle that had allegedly belonged to Peltier had been damaged in a fire. He testified that the most accurate ballistics test, the firing pin test, could not be performed. Instead, the FBI expert claimed to have performed a less precise test, finding that the bullet casing found near the bodies had matched the weapon. Among the documents later uncovered through the Freedom of Information Act, was the complete ballistics file of the FBI expert. He had indeed been able to perform the more precise test, and in doing so had concluded that the bullet could not have been fired from the rifle in question. There had been a decision made to conceal that report from the defense.

Demand for a new trial was repeatedly denied on the basis of technicalities.

In October 1985, US Prosecutor Lynn Crooks said, "We tried the case with the facts available. The facts available did not give us direct evidence as to who did the coup de grace. They simply didn’t.... We argued inferences and we certainly argued them strongly. But that’s not the same as saying that we had direct evidence by any one witness that Mr. Peltier was the one that squeezed off the final rounds." Crooks admitted there was no evidence directly tying Peltier to anything besides ‘aiding and abetting’ by virtue of his presence there that day.

Judge Gerald Heaney of the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals wrote the court opinion against granting Peltier a retrial. However, in 1991, Judge Heaney wrote a letter calling for clemency in Peltier’s case. In the letter, Heaney cites a careful study of the trial of Peltier’s co-defendants along with numerous other factors. His letter says, ‘The FBI used improper tactics in extraditing Peltier from Canada and in otherwise investigating and trying the Peltier case.’ The letter says, ‘While the government’s role in escalating the conflict into a firefight cannot serve as a legal justification for the killing of the FBI agents at short range, it can properly be considered as a mitigating circumstance.’

While the FBI Agents Association has said that clemency for Peltier would be unfair to the families of the agents who died, the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee feels that it is wrong to imprison a man based on an emotional argument while ample evidence exists which they believe highlights Peltier’s claims of innocence.

Bruce Ellison, Attorney for Leonard Peltier spoke with Oklahoma Indian Times. Ellison explained, "Clearly, the FBI is pulling out all stops because if Peltier is granted clemency, it gives credence to the call for a full scale investigation that has gone unheeded for twenty five years. They just want to shut this down and make it go away. The first calls for a congressional investigation of wrongdoing came from the Chairman of the US Civil Rights Commission, Arthur Fleming, in 1975."

Commenting on the current campaign for clemency for Peltier, Paul DeMain said, "I think most people believe that it’s a time to help heal the wounds of that time."

The Leonard Peltier Defense Committee is asking that supporters call the White House at (202) 456-1111 to encourage President Clinton to grant clemency and allow the wounds to begin to heal from this painful chapter.

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5 Date: 2001-02-08 06:22:34
Leonard's Supporters (no email / no homepage) wrote:

We know most of this is old news,but thought we would post it for the record.
Jean Day


"Reign of Terror"
Leonard Peltier: Political Prisoner
Jean Day, member of the Ho-Chunk nation will speak about the repressive conditions the Native people of the Pine Ridge Reservation endured during the " Reign of Terror" and of the wrongful incarceration of Leonard Peltier . She will also discuss the facts surrounding the case, long withheld from the public, which support Leonard's innocence.


The Case


In 1976, Leonard Peltier was convicted of killing two FBI agents during a June 26, 1975 shoot-out on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. Despite key evidence pointing to his innocence including falsified testimony by FBI coerced witnesses, 24 years later Leonard Peltier remains incarcerated in Leavenworth prison serving two consecutive life sentences. Amnesty International has declared Leonard Peltier a political prisoner. Other prominent human rights figures including the Dalai Lama, the Reverend Jesse Jackson, and South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu have also called for his immediate and unconditional release.

It is important to understand the history of events that led up to the shoot-out, including the US government's betrayal of Native people for years before the Pine Ridge incident. In 1973, two years prior to the fatal day, members of the American Indian Movement (AIM), together with friends and supporters, occupied the town of Wounded Knee, South Dakota to protest the ongoing repression of their peoples. The US government responded with military force. The siege ended only after members of Congress promised hearings to investigate the claims of maltreatment. But the hearings never took place. Instead, for the next two years the people of the Pine Ridge Reservation endured what is now referred to as the "Reign of Terror" during which at least 64 AIM members were murdered, and scores of others were battered, threatened and harassed. Despite massive FBI presence, nobody ever stood trial for these crimes.

It was in this atmosphere of terror and tension that on June 26, 1975, two FBI agents in an unmarked car chased a small pick-up truck on to a private ranch where a number of AIM members were encamped. A cross fire of shooting broke out and in the end two FBI agents and one Native American Youth, Joe Stuntz, lay dead. Leonard Peltier, one of several high level AIM leaders present, would ultimately be used as a scapegoat by the FBI to pay for the deaths of the agents. In fact, in the end the government attorney conceded, "We had a murder, we had numerous shooters, we do not know who specifically fired the shots. We do not know, quote unquote, who shot the agents."


For more information about the case, see the campaign to Free Leonard Peltier.

The Speaker


Jean Day has a personal connection to the case of Leonard Peltier. She was an active member of AIM during the "Reign of Terror" and saw many of her friends and family killed, disappeared, threatened and harassed during what some consider to be the largest headhunt of political leaders and most serious case of repression against Native Americans in modern decades.

Though silenced in the past due to fear of the FBI following through with its threats to her and her family, Jean is now prepared to speak out and share the truth about the mistreatment she and many others have had to live with for so long. She is an advocate for the immediate release of Leonard Peltier and can provide a current analysis of the case after the recent Leonard Peltier Freedom Month Campaign launched last November in Washington D.C.

As a member of the Ho-Chunk Nation, Jean now works as a Guardian at Litum for Native American children. She also has experience working in legislative planning and with youth in correctional facilities as a counselor. She is a certified Lay Advocate and has jurisdiction in Tribal Courts. Jean holds a BS in Sociology and an MS in Human Development and Community Resources from the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point.

To book an speaking event with Jean Day in your area, please contact the Speakers Bureau at speakers@globalexchange.org



4 Date: 2001-02-08 04:54:25
Advocate (no email / no homepage) wrote:

"Bright days and dark days were both expressions of the Great Mystery,
and the Indian reveled in being close to the Great Holiness."

--Chief Luther Standing Bear, SIOUX

The Great Spirit created a world of harmony, a world of justice, a
world that is interconnected, a balanced world that has positive and
negative, this way and that way, up and down, man and woman, boy and
girl, honest and dishonest, responsible and irresponsible, day and
night. In other words, He created a polarity system. Both sides are to
be respected. Both sides or anything are sacred. We need to do good and
we need to learn from our mistakes. We need to honor what takes place in
the daytime and we need to honor what takes place in the nighttime. WE
learn that we need to learn and we see what we are supposed to see by
staying close to the Great Spirit. We need to be talking to Him all the
time, saying "Grandfather, what is it you want me to learn?"


Great Spirit,
let me learn
today that all
things are
sacred. Help
me stay close
to You, my
Creator.




3 Date: 2001-02-08 04:51:45
Advocate (no email / no homepage) wrote:

THINK ON THESE THINGS
by Joyce Sequichie Hifler

We all have the capacity to be many things -- good or bad. Dominant
traits may exist -- in fact, we know they do exist. The quantity doesn't
matter -- but what is important is what we do with what we have.
Complaining only takes up precious time and gains us nothing.

So many we have known made a career out of being grossly negative, even
though they may have fine opportunities. And then there are those who
take one small idea and studies its possibilities until it becomes an
asset that cannot be ignored.

Whatever happens to us is the result of what we dwell on in our thinking
and imaging continually. We are the designers, the engineers, the
builders -- and essentially the marketers. None of are destined to fail
-- unless we decide we were born to lose.



2 Date: 2001-02-08 04:50:04
Advocate Investigator (N_A_Advocate@mindspring.com / no homepage) wrote:

"I believe that being a medicine man, more than anything else, is a
state of mind, a way of looking at and understanding this earth, a sense
of what it is all about."

--Lame Deer, LAKOTA

The Medicine Wheel explains different ways of looking at the world. The
four directions are the East, the South, the West and the North. In the
East is the view of the eagle-the eagle flies high and sees the earth
from that point of view. The South his the direction of the mouse.
Moving on the earth, the mouse will not see what the eagle sees. Both
the eagle and the mouse see the truth. The West is the direction of the
bear-the bear will see different from the mouse and the eagle. From the
North comes the point of view of the bison. To be a Medicine Man you
must journey through all points of view and develop the mind to see the
interconnectedness of all four directions. This takes time, patience and
an open mind. Eventually, you understand there is only love.


Great Spirit,
today, allow
my mind to
stay open.




1 Date: 2001-02-08 04:37:33
Advocate (no email / no homepage) wrote:

WASHINGTON, D.C., Feb 7, 2001 (BUSINESS WIRE
> FEATURES) -- While the United States ranks third
> highest in entrepreneurial activity among the
> world's leading economies, Native Americans continue
> to struggle in - and face severe obstacles to -
> starting and growing entrepreneurial ventures in
> their communities, according to the "Global
> Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) 2000 National
> Entrepreneurship Assessment for the United States of
> America".
>
> "Native Americans, in many ways, are doing better
> than ever in building economies and strengthening
> their communities," said Andrew Zacharakis of Babson
> College and the lead U.S. GEM researcher. "There is,
> however, still much more to be done to help Native
> Americans use entrepreneurship as a tool to create
> jobs and wealth in their communities."
>
> The study, part of an international study of
> entrepreneurship and its impact on economic activity
> in 21 countries conducted by Babson College and the
> Kauffman Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership,
> includes a Special Report that examined the level of
> entrepreneurial activity among Native Americans
> across the country. The study's key findings
> include:
>
>
> - One major hindrance to the formation of
> entrepreneurial
> businesses among Native Americans is
> inadequate physical
> infrastructure on Reservations and Tribal
> lands, including
> poor water and electrical systems,
> substandard housing,
> inadequate road and transportation systems,
> and deficient
> communications networks.
>
> - Key improvements in education, especially
> in early grades (six
> to nine years old), are vital to help young
> people develop
> self-confidence and an "entrepreneurial
> mentality."
>
> - Experts suggest entrepreneurship education
> programs be
> developed and located outside of Native
> American
> post-secondary institutions, where most of
> these programs are
> currently housed. Entrepreneurship
> curricula also should match
> accepted methods of instruction for Native
> American students,
> including storytelling.
>
> - Native Americans who are successful
> entrepreneurs need to
> become role models in their communities to
> show young people
> how to start business ventures.
>
> According to GEM, experts in Native American
> economic issues point to systemic problems in Indian
> government that thwart creation of start-up firms.
> The Tribal Council often injects itself into the
> entrepreneur's venture. For example, saying who must
> be hired. On occasion, Tribal Councils have taken
> the entrepreneur's idea and established the company
> itself. In addition, experts point to various social
> norms among Native Americans, such as abhorrence of
> income disparity, that inhibit some entrepreneurial
> activity.
>
> "Social norms strongly influence the prevalence, or
> lack thereof, of start-ups among Native Americans,"
> said Zacharakis. "Whereas the U.S. as a whole can be
> considered individualistic with a propensity for
> independence, Native Americans are more
> community-oriented."
>
> "GEM 2000 clearly shows what factors contribute to
> low levels of entrepreneurship among Native
> Americans. What's important to note is Native
> Americans across the country are working hard to
> begin the effort to build entrepreneurial economies
> in their communities. Now it's just a matter of time
> before we see substantial improvements," said S.
> Michael Camp, GEM project director and director of
> research at the Kauffman Center for Entrepreneurial
> Leadership.


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