Here are the materials on Owen v. Weber:
A statement of the case from the appellant:
This appeal arrives from the district court’s order denying a petition for writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2254 filed by Lance George Owen, who is currently serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole in the South Dakota State Penitentiary. The central question is whether the state court that convicted Owen of committing a murder and aggravated assault at a tribal government housing unit — leased and operated by the Sisseton-Wahpeton Oyate Indian Tribe — had proper jurisdiction to do so, or whether only the federal government had jurisdiction to prosecute the crime under the Indian Major Crimes Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1153.
The district court concluded that the state court had proper jurisdiction over Owen. This conclusion was incorrect, and an unreasonable application of federal law to the record below, because the tribal government housing project qualified as a dependent Indian community and therefore fit within the definition of “Indian country” set forth in 18 U.S.C. § 1151. As a result, Owen’s habeas petition was incorrectly denied and the district court’s order sealing a contrary fate accordingly should be reversed.
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