News article here.
H/T to A.K.
Sen. Daniel Akaka Will Not Seek Re-election in 2012
News article here.
H/T to A.K.
News
Update in Muscogee Nation Upheaval
Here is a press release issued today by the Muscogee National Council titled, “Bureau of Indian Affairs Fails to Investigate Allegations of Tribal and Federal Funds.”
Jack Forbes Walks On
Chickaloon Invites United Nations to Investigate Water Pollution
Here is the press release: Press release chickaloon communication
An excerpt:
Chickaloon Native Village, a federally-recognized Athabascan Indian Tribal government in Alaska, filed a communication to the United Nations Independent Expert on the human right to water and sanitation in conjunction with her first official visit to the United States, which began today.
Chickaloon Village’s submission asserts that the new open-pit coal strip mine in its traditional territory proposed by the Usibelli Corporation would contaminate local drinking water sources as well as rivers, streams and groundwater that support salmon, moose and other animals and plants vital for subsistence, religious and cultural practices. The US Federal Government and the State of Alaska have, to date, not responded to Chickaloon’s firmly-stated opposition to the mine.
The visit to the US by the Independent Expert, Mrs. Catarina de Albuquerque, a Portuguese human rights expert appointed by the UN Human Rights Council, includes stops in Washington DC, Boston Massachusetts and Northern California, where she will meet with the Winnemem Wintu and other Indigenous representatives. Her US visit will end on March 2, 2011.
During her visit she will meet with the US State Department and relevant Federal agencies as well organizations, communities and experts to receive information regarding the human right to water and sanitation and the federal and state policies and practices that affect this right. She is expected to make recommendations to the US government at the conclusion of her visit.
Op-Ed Letter on Vanderbilt Casino
A letter in the Flint Journal by Ken Harrington, tribal chairman, Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians; David K. Sprague, tribal chairman, Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians; Homer A. Mandoka, tribal chairman, Nottawaseppi Huron Band of Potawatomi Indians; Dennis V. Kequom, tribal chief, Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe.
All tribes rely on Indian gaming to fund health care, housing, education and cultural preservation for seven generations to come. It has brought hope to our people and we cannot allow the reckless actions of one tribe to jeopardize our future.
As tribal leaders, we are acutely aware of the need to honor our promises. We made promises to the people of Michigan in our gaming compacts, and we will continue to honor our commitments. We urge the Bay Mills Tribe to do the same.
News Article on Need for Greater Race and Gender Diversity on Iowa’s Supreme Court
Here. An excerpt:
The lone female finalist is Angela Onwauchi-Willig, 37, a University of Iowa law professor who was admitted to practice law in Iowa the day the finalists were announced. Onwauchi-Willig, who is also the only minority nominee, is admitted as a lawyer for state and federal courts in Ohio, and the federal appeals-court circuit that includes Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee.
During her interview with the commission, Onwuachi-Willig pointed to her experience as a scholar but also urged commission members to consider candidates who reflect the gender and race of Iowa’s population. Her research and teaching interests at the law school span a range of family law, employment discrimination, feminist legal theory and evidence.
Women account for roughly one-fourth of all state court judges and magistrates in Iowa, according to judicial branch statistics. None of the current Iowa Supreme Court justices are women; five of the nine-member Court of Appeals judges are women.
By contrast, nearly one-third of the nation’s 340 state supreme court justices are women, according to the National Center for State Courts. Twenty females serve as chief justices, and five supreme courts – California, Michigan, Tennessee, Wisconsin, and the District of Columbia – have a majority of women members.
ICT Article on Tribal Law and Order Commission
Here. An excerpt:
Federal justice on reservations is discriminatory and harsh, especially for youth, but recently enhanced tribal justice systems – a potential remedy – may not be easy to implement, says a noted advocate for Native rights.
The 2010 Tribal Law and Order Act (TLOA) initiated a nine-member Indian Law and Order Commission that includes Denver-based Troy Eid, a former U.S. Attorney, who has worked with a number of tribes. He and other Commission members have held informal discussions pending full Commission funding.
The Major Crimes Act of 1855, which covers Indian perpetrators and victims on tribal lands, is discriminatory in that it provides harsher penalties for Indian offenders than for non-Natives for essentially the same crimes, he said. It strikes hard at teenaged Indian offenders, about one-third of whom are sentenced as adults as compared to only one to two percent of non-Native youth.
The federal system the Native youth enter requires them to serve about 85 percent of their sentences and there is no parole, while in the state of Colorado, for example, the average proportion of sentences served is 32 percent. There are no juvenile diversion programs, alternative sentencing, restorative justice or other federal rehabilitative programs comparable to those at state level, he said.
Enter TLOA: It reauthorizes substance abuse programs and grants for summer youth programs, constructs youth shelters and detention and treatment centers, develops long-term plans for Indian juvenile detention and substance abuse treatment centers, and supports tribal juvenile delinquency prevention services and care of juvenile offenders.
The Tribal Youth Program would authorize $25 million annually through 2015 for juvenile delinquency prevention services and the care of juvenile offenders.
South Dakota Rep. Kevin Killer (D -Pine Ridge) hailed the potential of the youth programs for his district, where more than half of residents are under age 18, and his state, where nearly 40 percent of those in the juvenile justice system are Native youth. Restorative programs are probably among those the Oglala Lakota would be interested in pursuing, he said.
Other major TLOA provisions allow participating tribal courts to impose penalties of up to three years’ imprisonment compared to the existing one-year limit and require tribal courts to provide court-funded licensed defense attorneys for indigent defendants, with more stringent qualifications for both attorneys and judges.
TLOA offers some financial support for enhanced tribal justice systems – a cost, which Eid himself says is “substantial” and which the Congressional Budget Office estimated at about $1 billion over the first five years.
News Coverage of Armijo v. Laguna Pueblo
An excerpt from the ABQ Journal article:
A land dispute between Laguna Pueblo and a rancher prompted the New Mexico Court of Appeals to rule that tribal sovereignty shields tribes and pueblos from lawsuits involving lands they own outside their reservations.
The dispute centers on a 640-acre property in the Mount Taylor foothills. Cibola County rancher Robert Armijo contends he bought the property in 1994 from the Cebolleta Land Grant and has a warranty deed to prove it.
The Pueblo of Laguna claims the parcel is part of 8,300 acres the pueblo purchased in 2008 from Silver Dollar Ranch LLC.
In a Dec. 6 opinion, the Appeals Court found a district court judge lacked jurisdiction to decide who owns the property because the pueblo enjoys immunity from lawsuits, even if the land is outside its boundaries.
A legal concept called tribal sovereign immunity has long protected tribes and pueblos from lawsuits on tribal lands, which are held in trust by the U.S. Department of the Interior.
An attorney representing Armijo said the Court of Appeals ruling extends tribal sovereign immunity to “fee lands” purchased on the open market by tribes and pueblos but not held in trust.
“The decision is problematic,” Belen attorney Tibo Chavez said. “Sovereign immunity elevates the tribes above constitutionally protected property rights.”
The ruling may forestall any type of legal claim related to off-reservation properties owned by tribes and pueblos, he said.
“What if someone was injured on this land?” Chavez said. “Are there applications of negligence law that would apply?”
Albuquerque attorney Daniel Rey-Bear, who represents Pueblo of Laguna, declined to comment on the case.
Akaka appoints Tuell as Staff Director for Indian Affairs Committee
The news article is here.
Ecuadorean Judge Orders Chevron to Pay $9B in Damages for Polluting Lands of Indigenous Peoples
Here is the permalink to the NYTs article.
An excerpt:
a judge in a tiny courtroom in the Ecuadorean Amazon ruled Monday that the oil giant Chevron was responsible for polluting remote tracts of Ecuadorean jungle and ordered the company to pay more than $9 billion in damages, one of the largest environmental awards ever.
The decision by Judge Nicolás Zambrano in Lago Agrio, a town founded as an oil camp in the 1960s, immediately opened a contentious new stage of appeals in a legal battle that has dragged on in courts in Ecuador and the United States for 17 years, pitting forest tribes and villagers against one of the largest American corporations.
The award against Chevron “is one of the largest judgments ever imposed for environmental contamination in any court,” said David M. Uhlmann, an expert in environmental law at the University of Michigan. “It falls well short of the $20 billion that BP has agreed to pay to compensate victims of the gulf oil spill but is a landmark decision nonetheless. Whether any portion of the claims will be paid by Chevron is less clear.”
Both sides said they would appeal the ruling, setting the stage for months and potentially years more of legal wrangling in the closely watched case, which has already been marked by claims of industrial espionage and fraud, and remarkably bitter disputes among the various lawyers involved. Legal experts said that the size of the award and the attention the case has focused on environmental degradation were likely to encourage similar suits.
The 188-page ruling found Chevron responsible for damages of about $8.6 billion, and perhaps double that amount if Chevron fails to publicly apologize for its actions within 15 days. The judge also ordered Chevron to pay $860 million, or 10 percent of the damages, to the Amazon Defense Coalition, the group formed to represent the plaintiffs.
Turtle Talk 
You must be logged in to post a comment.