From the Las Cruces Sun-News (h/t Indianz):
ALBUQUERQUE – Months before the Navajo Nation’s first casino is scheduled to open, a group is planning to sue over the validity of legislation that provides for financing the development of that casino and others.
This case, involving the tribal court exhaustion doctrine, was argued before the Ninth Circuit in May 2007 before Brunetti, McKeown, and William Fletcher. A parallel case is ongoing in the Yakama tribal court.
Here are the materials:
Anderson v. Henson is a 25 USC 1303 (ICRA Habeas) claim that the Gila River tribal court was improperly installed and therefore convictions in that court are invalid. The District of Arizona rejected the claim.
Here are the materials:
The final report of this important forum is here (in pieces). Obviously parts of it are very dated, but this is important material regardless as legislative history of MCR 2.615.
Appendix II — Directory of Tribal Courts
From the Seattle Times:
Five Makah tribal members who already face federal charges for killing a gray whale off Neah Bay in September have now been charged in Makah Tribal Court for participating in the unauthorized hunt.
The charges were filed in tribal court on Nov. 16 but weren’t made public until Monday, when the last of the five was officially served with court papers, said Makah tribal attorney John Arum.
Wayne Johnson, Frankie Gonzales, Andrew Noel, Theron Parker and William Secor each face five charges in tribal court, including the violation of the tribe’s Gray Whale Management Plan.
If convicted, they could face up to a year in the tribal jail, a $5,000 fine and a three-year suspension of their tribal fishing rights for participating in the Sept. 8 hunt.
The five were charged in federal court in Tacoma last month and pleaded not guilty to misdemeanor violations of the federal Marine Mammal Protection Act.
It is unclear whether the men will first be tried in federal or tribal court, Arum said. Arraignment on the tribal-court charges is expected in the next two or three weeks, he said.
From the The Glacier Reporter:
By John McGill
Wednesday, November 28, 2007 10:26 AM MST
The fact that Bureau of Indian Affairs police officers serving in Blackfeet Country cannot be compelled to appear in Blackfeet Tribal Court by tribal judges, according to a recent U.S. Solicitor General’s opinion, was one of the more interesting tidbits garnered at Monday’s law and order meeting held at Tribal Headquarters. Steve Juneau of Lamar Associates emceed the meeting, which outlined plans adopted by the Blackfeet Tribe for reassuming control of law enforcement and creating a Department of Public Safety that would “provide leadership separate from political changes in tribal government,” Juneau said.
From the Rapid City Journal (H/T Indianz):
Members of the Oglala Sioux Tribal Council who were suspended for not taking a drug test have been reinstated, after a tribal judge struck down the requirement.
In October, the tribal council passed a resolution requiring members and other elected officials to take a “hair follicle” drug test.
The ordinance was in response to the arrest in New Mexico of Councilman Don Garnier, who faces a federal charge of possession of marijuana with intent to distribute it.
Tribal Judge Lisa Adams earlier this month upheld the test for council members but struck down the requirement for the tribe’s treasurer.
On Nov. 7, a motion to rescind the drug-test requirement order failed by a vote of 12-2 of the tribal council.
Last week, however, Judge Adams killed the measure “in its entirety for vagueness,” according to documents faxed to the Rapid City Journal from the office of Oglala Sioux Tribe President John Steele.
At least 11 tribal officials took the hair-follicle test, as did Steele.
Two council members refused, arguing the council had no authority to pass the ordinance.
Three council members took a urinalysis test for drugs instead.
One council member’s test was canceled when the machine malfunctioned, and another couldn’t take the test because his hair was too short.
Garnier, who refused the test, remains suspended pending the outcome of charges against him.
It was unclear how many council members had actually been suspended for failing to take the test, but the question apparently is moot.
In a written memo to tribal council members, also faxed to the Journal, Steele said tribal officials suspended were reinstated with pay.
I’ve always taught my federal Indian law students that many — if not most — of the tribal constitutions adopted in the years immediately following the Indian Reorganization Act were imposed on the tribes by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. These were the model IRA constitutions. If you look at the constitutions adopted around that time, you see a lot of similar features: lack of separation of powers, no tribal courts, Secretarial approvals for everything up to and including breathing. But as Blake said, he who generalizes is a fool.
Recent works of scholarship challenge that notion that the Bureau imposed model constitutions. First, Elmer Rusco’s chapter in American Indian Constitutional Reform and the Rebuilding of Native Nations. And now David Wilkins’s introduction to the new book, Felix S. Cohen’s On the Drafting of Tribal Constitutions. Elmer Rusco’s 2000 book on the IRA, A Fateful Time, argues that the BIA considered thrusting model constitutions at tribes, but rejected the plan in favor of an outline. Wilkins notes that it appears some tribes did receive a model constitution from the BIA (the one reproduced as Appendix A in the Cohen book), and others received a model corporate charter or the outline.
It would be worthwhile to do a survey of the 181 tribes that voted to accept the IRA. What do their constitutions say?
An interesting case (to me anyway) that has been winding its way through state, tribal, and now federal courts — a case involving an investment contract between the Grand Ronde Confederated Tribes and Strategic Wealth Management (and now its insurance company). In short, the deal between the two went bad and the parties ended up in state court, then before an arbitrator. The arbitrator ruled against the tribe, and awarded millions in attorney fees to SWM (but nothing else). The tribe refused to pay, arguing that it had not waived its immunity in relation to attorney fees, and SWM went to tribal court to enforce the arbitration award of attorney fees. The tribal court affirmed the tribe’s claim of immunity and now the case is in federal district court on a Montana 1 theory (huh?). Anyway, I wrote about this case as it went through the tribal court recently (here). And I personally know the two principals of SWM from my work at Pascua Yaqui a thousand years ago.
This may look like a tribe hiding behind sovereign immunity, but keep in mind that the Sizemore brothers (the SWM principals) prided themselves on being “experts” on federal Indian law (despite not being lawyers) and wrote the contract at issue. Moreover, the amount of atty fees awarded by the arbitrator was extraordinary (in the millions).
Contract with Strategic Wealth Management
Tribal Court of Appeals Opinion
Federal District Court Materials:
Plaintiff Motion for Summary Judgment
From the Rapid City Journal (H/T Indianz):
The Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Court will now recognize judgments made in state court and other tribal courts.
“In exchange, South Dakota’s Unified Judicial System will recognize and honor judgments made in Standing Rock Sioux Tribal Court.
Tribal Rule 23, which allows the Standing Rock court to recognize court rulings from other jurisdictions, was adopted by the tribal court and signed by tribal Chairman Ron His Horse Is Thunder.
Because of Rule 23, South Dakota courts are now authorized under state statute to recognize Standing Rock court orders and judgments.
“It is the first tribe that has actually notified us that they have court rule in place that has been signed by the chairman of the tribe and by the court,” said Judith Roberts, legal counsel for the Unified Judicial System.
Turtle Talk 
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