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"When colonial white society invades and occupies our territories these are not called criminal acts. But when Native people stand up and resist, these acts are considered criminal. But these are not crimes. They are political acts in which our people stand up for their rights of self-determination, self-dignity, and self-respect against the cruel and oppressive might of another nation· It is not a new development for white society to steal from non-white people. When white society succeeds, it is called colonialism. When white societyâs efforts to colonise other people are met with resistance, it is called war. But when the colonized Indians of North America meet this theft with resistance, we are called criminals."(Leonard Peltier, May 1976) Leonard Peltier Defense Committee Get Leonard Peltier's book "Prison Writings:
My Life is my Sun Dance" from his defense committee. Native American Activist Files Lawsuit
Against FBI Contact: Leonard Peltier Defense Committee (785) 842-5774; lpdc@freepeltier.org Former FBI Director Louis Freeh is named as a defendant in a lawsuit filed today by attorneys for imprisoned Native American activist, Leonard Peltier. Freeh, along with the FBI Agents Association and a long list of active FBI agents, are accused of violating Peltier's Constitutional rights by making false and unsupported statements to the public, the Department of Justice, the United States Parole Commission, and former President Clinton. The complaint, filed in U.S. District Court, Washington D.C., alleges that the FBI "engaged in a systematic, and officially sanctioned campaign of mis-information and dis-information" designed to prevent Peltier from receiving fair clemency and parole reviews. The suit follows a highly controversial campaign conducted by the FBI to stop former president Bill Clinton from issuing Peltier a grant of executive clemency during his last days in office. FBI agents across the nation submitted letters to the editor, sponsored major newspaper and radio ads, and marched by the hundreds in front of the White House to discourage clemency. Former FBI Director Louis Freeh wrote searing letters to Bill Clinton and Janet Reno, to urge against Peltier's release. The campaign, which gained national attention, characterized Peltier as a cold-blooded killer who brutally shot two FBI agents at point blank range. Peltier's attorneys and supporters assert that this characterization is not only false but intentionally deceptive given the government's long held position that it cannot prove who shot the agents. Furthermore, they say it cost Peltier, now 57 years of age and in poor health, his long deserved freedom. Peltier has served more than 26 years in prison for the deaths of two FBI agents killed in a 1975 shoot-out on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. Peltier's supporters assert the FBI terrorized witnesses, utilized false testimony and withheld a ballistic test proving Peltier's innocence to gain his conviction. Senior Eighth Circuit Judge Gerald Heaney, who denied Peltier a new trial based on a legal technicality, has since come forward to support Peltier's release, citing FBI misconduct. Amnesty International, the Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights, Rev. Jesse Jackson, Rigoberta Menchu Tum, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Corretta Scott King, and scores of Native tribes are among those who consider Peltier a political prisoner who should be freed. BACKGROUND Leonard Peltier, a citizen of the Anishinabe and Lakota Nations, is a father, a grandfather, an artist, a writer, and an Indigenous rights activist. He has spent nearly twenty-six years in prison for a crime he did not commit. Amnesty International considers him a "political prisoner" who should be "immediately and unconditionally released." To the international community, the case of Leonard Peltier is a stain on America's Human Rights record. Nelson Mandela, Rigoberta Menchu, the U.N. High Commissioner on Human Rights, the Dalai Lama, the European Parliament, the Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights, and Rev. Jesse Jackson are only a few who have called for his freedom. To many Indigenous Peoples, Leonard Peltier is a symbol of the long history of abuse and repression they have endured. The National Congress of American Indians and the Assembly of First Nations, representing the majority of First Nations in the U.S. and Canada, have repeatedly called for Leonard Peltier's freedom. Leonard Peltier is 56 years old and was born on the Anishinabe (Chippewa) Turtle Mountain Reservation in North Dakota. He came from a large family of 13 brothers and sisters. He grew up in poverty, and survived many traumatic experiences resulting from U.S. government policies aimed to assimilate Native Peoples. At the age of eight he was taken from his family and sent to a residential boarding school for Native people run by the US Government. There, the students were forbidden to speak their languages and they suffered both physical and psychological abuses. As a teenager Leonard Peltier returned to live with his father at the Turtle Mountain Reservation in North Dakota. It was one of three reservations, which the United States Government chose as the testing ground for its new termination policy. The policy forced Native families off their reservations and into the cities. The resulting protests and demonstrations by tribal members introduced Leonard Peltier to Native resistance through activism and organizing. During one particularly difficult winter on the Turtle Mountain Reservation Leonard Peltier recollects protests by his people to the Bureau of Indian Affairs about the desperate lack of food. (The termination policy withdrew federal assistance, including food, from those who remained on their land). Following these protests, B.I.A. social workers came to the reservation to investigate the situation. Leonard Peltier and one of the organizers on the reservation went from household to household before the arrival of the investigating party to tell the local people to hide what little food they had. When he got to the first house, he found that there was no food to hide and the same story was repeated in each of the households that he went to. This experience awakened him to the desperate situation for all people on his reservation. As he grew older, he began traveling with his father as a migrant farm worker. While following the harvests, they stayed at different reservations. During this time, he came to learn that policies of relocation, poverty, and racism were endemic issues affecting tribes across the U.S. In 1965, Leonard Peltier moved to Seattle, Washington, where he worked for several years as part owner of an auto body shop which he used to employ Native people and to provide low-cost automobile repairs for those who needed it. During the same period, he was also active in the founding of a Native halfway house for ex- prisoners. His community volunteer work included Native Land Claim issues, alcohol counseling, and participation in protests concerning the preservation of Native land within the city of Seattle. In the late 1960's and early 1970's Leonard Peltier began traveling to different Native communities. He spent a lot of time in Washington and Wisconsin and was working as a welder, carpenter, and community counselor for Native people. In the course of his work he became involved with the American Indian Movement (AIM) and eventually joined the Denver Colorado chapter. In Denver, he worked as a community counselor confronting unemployment, alcohol problems and poor housing. He became strongly involved in the spiritual and traditional programs of AIM. Leonard Peltier's participation in the American Indian Movement led to his involvement in the 1972 Trail of broken Treaties which took him to Washington D.C., in the occupation of the Bureau of Indian Affairs building. Eventually his AIM involvement would bring him to assist the Oglala Lakota People of the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota in the mid 1970's. On Pine Ridge he participated in the planning of community activities, religious ceremonies, programs for self-sufficiency, and improved living conditions. He also helped to organize security for the traditional people who were being targeted for violence by the pro- assimilation tribal chairman and his vigilantes. It was here that the tragic shoot-out of June 26, 1975 occurred, leading to his wrongful conviction. Despite the harsh conditions of imprisonment, Leonard Peltier has continued to lead an active life. From behind bars, he has helped to establish scholarships for Native students and special programs for Indigenous youth. He has served on the advisory board of the Rosenberg Fund for Children, and has sponsored children in Central America. He has donated to battered women's shelters, organized the annual Christmas drive for the people of Pine Ridge Reservation, and promoted prisoner art programs. He has also established himself as a talented artist, using oils to paint portraits of his people, portraying their cultures and histories. He has written poetry and prose from prison, and recently completed a moving biography titled Prison Writings: My Life Is My Sun Dance (St. Martin's Press, NY, 1999). Leonard Peltier credits his ability to endure his circumstances to his spiritual practices and the love and support from his family and supporters. Write to Leonard Peltier:
Leonard Peltier #89637-132 Statement from Leonard Peltier - October 12th 2001 Brothers, Sisters, Friends, and Supporters, Today marks 509 years since Columbus arrived on the shores of Turtle Island, where he first staked claim to the cherished lands of our ancestors. Although Columbus is long dead, the legacy of injustice that he began continues. Whether it be relocation of the Dine at Big Mountain, the persecution of Indigenous Peoples throughout Latin America, the fishing struggles in Canada, or the dumping of toxic waste on reservations, the dehumanization of Indigenous Peoples remains pervasive throughout the Americas. As we see in the spirits of the grandmothers of Big Mountain, the Mi'Kmaqs of Burnt Church, or the Zapatistas of Chiapas, Indigenous resistance also remains alive. It is in this spirit of resistance that I am inspired to continue fighting for my own freedom after 25 years of unjust imprisonment. I want to thank you all for your concern and continued support. I know that these are very difficult and unpredictable times for us all. Although the LPDC has expressed condolences and sympathy on my behalf, I would like a chance to personally say how sorry I am to any of you who lost loved ones on September 11. Please know that I have been prayingfor you and for peace ever since. Despite the difficult times we are faced with, and despite this year's clemency defeat, I am feeling blessed. I have to admit that I feared being forgotten after I did not receive clemency. But instead of finding myself alone, I have been surrounded by more compassionate and talented people than ever before - and they have all expressed their determination to continue the struggle for my release. People who I greatly respect like Dr. Michael Yellow Bird, Nilak Butler, Thom White Wolf Fassett, Debra Peebles and Debra White Plume, to name only a small few, have joined the LPDC. I want to thank Jennifer Harbury, Pat Benabe, Gina Chiala, Jean Day, and Sylvain Duez-Alesandrini for bringing our new team together and sticking with me. I also want to thank all of you - I received hundreds of birthday cards last month and my spirits were greatly lifted knowing that you are still with us. Without you, I could have no hope. I am also very encouraged by the new strategies the LPDC plans to pursue on my behalf. We have three new, very important cases to file and the lawyers in charge of them are very dedicated and talented. But I must say that without your active participation, these cases will mean very little. Public pressure is the key to fairness and justice. In closing, I would like to wish you all a happy "Indigenous Day" and encourage you to continue advocating for the rights of Indigenous Peoples. Although prison life becomes more and more difficult with age, my spirit remains unbroken, and I still dream of rejoining my people in freedom and continuing our work for human rights and justice.
THE CASE OF LEONARD PELTIER On the morning of June 26, 1975, two FBI agents drove onto Indian land near Oglala, South Dakota, a small village on the Pine Ridge Reservation, where there was a camp of American Indian Movement activists. Here a shoot-out occurred in which both agents and an Indian man were killed. Despite a fast mobilisation of FBI agents, Bureau of Indian Affairs police and state troopers all the Indians involved in the shoot-out escaped into the hills. Four men were eventually indicted for the killings; Jimmy Eagle was released due to Îweak evidenceâ, Bob Robideau and Dino Butler stood trial in July 1976 and were acquitted. The jury concluded that although they had fired at the agents they had done so in self-defense. Leonard Peltier had fled to Canada where he tried to fight extradition, but in he was returned to the United States, and in April 1977 he was found guilty of two counts of murder in the first degree, and was sentenced to two consecutive life terms. The shoot-out was not an isolated event , but the culmination of an FBI war against the American Indian Movement and the escalating violence on the Pine Ridge Reservation. The people of Pine Ridge, terrified for their lives, had invited the American Indian Movement there for protection. It was this situation that led to the self-defense verdict at the trial of Rodideau and Butler. "Whatever the nature and degree of his participation at Oglala, the ruthless persecution of Leonard Peltier had less to do with his own actions than with the underlying issues of history, racism and economics," (Peter Matthiessen, In the Spirit of Crazy Horse) THE EVIDENCE Peltierâs trial was disadvantaged right from the start. The FBI were determined to get a conviction for the murder of their two agents, and Peltier was their last chance. Then the Judge ruled that all evidence other than the specific events of June 26th was inadmissable, this included the violence on Pine Ridge, the FBI persecution of AIM, and the verdict and all testimonies from Robideau and Bulterâs Cedar Rapids trial. The government's case rested on a weak circumstantial chain of events: - The "red pickup-truck" that the agents were following, suddenly became the "red and white van" that Peltier owned. Thus "proving" that Peltier was involved in the shooting from the beginning. - The coroner's report established that both of the agents had been killed by bullets fired at close range from a small-calliber, high-velocity weapon of an unspecified type - A spent .223 calibre cartridge casing - a small calibre, high-velocity bullet- was allegedly recovered from the trunk of Agent Colerâs car. However FBI documents indicated that it was found by two different agents on two different days. There was no record of it being handled, who was in possession of it, or how it arrived at the crime lab in Washington DC. Consequently there was no proof it was the same cartridge - A Colt AR-15 rifle - which fires a .223 calibre round - was recovered from Bob Robideauâs exploded car near Wichita. - FBI agent Hodge testifies that, despite inconclusive tests, he could identify the .223 calibre cartridge as coming from that exploded AR-15 rifle. Since an AR-15 can only eject cartridges about five meters it was concluded that the rifle was fired near the agent's cars and hence their bodies - Having "established" that the AR-15 was the murder weapon, the prosecution produced several eye-witnesses to prove Leonard Peltier was carrying an AR-15 on the day of the firefight This was the evidence that Peltier had committed premeditated murder of two FBI agents. There was only one witness claiming Peltier had actually participated in the killings. She was mentally unbalanced and was subjected to severe FBI harassment, even the prosecution dismissed her testimony as worthless. But Judge Benson would not allow her to be cross-examined. Benson would not allow FBI agents to be cross-examined concerning discrepancies between their testimony and either prior sworn statements or written documents. He would not allow the later testimony of prosecution eye-witnesses that they had lied because of FBI threats and coercion. Fifteen days of witnesses, testimonies, diagrams, weapon displays and gory photos never proved Peltier as the killer, but it did establish that two white men, surrounded and outnumbered by Indians, had been brutally murdered, execution-style. The all-white jury found Peltier guilty. Despite no previous felony convictions he was sent to the infamous super-maximum security prison at Marion, Illinois. Peltier continues his activist work from prison; focussing attention on wider issues such as he denial of religious rights to indigenous prisoners, denial of critical medical treatment to prisoners and other violations of international human rights conventions. THE AMERICAN INDIAN MOVEMENT The American Indian Movement was set up in Minneapolis in 1968 in response to the 80% unemployment, slum housing and police brutality that faced Indians. In the first year AIM set up a legal rights centre in Minneapolis, a street patrol, protecting Indians from police violence, filming arrests and helping with legal advice and costs, and started a program to assist juvenile offenders as an alternative to reform school. In 1970 AIM began its own Îsurvival schoolâ, ãan attempt to help young Indians adjust to the white society without losing what was most valuable in their own cultureä (Peter Matthiessen).. And for many of Indians, taken from the reservations and dumped in boarding schools or city slums, it was a chance to educate them about their culture, to correct the lies and myths normally taught in schools. AIM chapters quickly spread around the country and established a national agenda tackling issues of treaty rights and self-determination for Indian Nations. Further Reading: Peter Matthiessen, 'In the Spirit of Crazy
Horse' Ward Churchill and Jimmy Vander Wall 'Cages
of Steel' |
In
the Spirit of Crazy Horse,