Menominee Indian Reservation

Federal Agents Raid Menominee Tribe

Sarah M Donnelly3 Comments

U.S. News report here.

Search warrant and affidavits (PDF) here.

The Tribe is being accused of growing hemp plants with too much THC in them, but the Tribe says they were upfront to the Feds about seedlings they received for industrial hemp research:

Former U.S. Attorney for North Dakota Tim Purdon is working with the Menominee tribe and blasted the raid as a “waste of resources” that “is exacerbated by the fact that the Tribe had agreed to act itself to destroy individual strains of the hemp crop that the Tribe and the U.S. Attorney’s Office agreed were problematic.”

“This misallocation of federal resources is exactly what the [2013] Cole and [2014] Wilkinson Memos were designed to prevent,” he said, referring to the Justice Department memos allowing states and tribes, respectively, to regulate marijuana.

The Menominee Tribe legalized marijuana back in August, but the government has not yet enacted regulations concerning its sale and production.

Vagueness Challenge to Major Crimes Act Fails

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

The case is United States v. Nahwahquaw, out of the Eastern District of Wisconsin — NAHWAHQUAW Report and Recommendation (the district court judge adopted the recommendation). An excerpt:

Even if the court were to conclude that the defendant can maintain a facial challenge to § 1153(a), which it does not, the term “Indian” is not unconstitutionally vague on its face. Although “Indian” is not defined in the statute, the test for determining “Indian” status has been judicially defined over the years and is well established under federal law. The test, first suggested in United States v. Rogers, 45 U.S. 567 (1846) and generally followed by the courts, considers: “(1) the degree of Indian blood; and (2) tribal or governmental recognition as an Indian.” United States v. Torres, 733 F.2d 449, 456 (7th Cir.1984) (quoting United States v. Broncheau, 597 F.2d 1260, 1263 [9th Cir.1979] ) (emphasis supplied by Torres ); See also, United States v. Keys, 103 F.3d 758, 760 (9th Cir.1996); United States v. Dodge, 538 F.2d 770, 786 (8th Cir.1976). Tribal enrollment is “the common evidentiary means of establishing Indian status, but it is not the only means nor is it necessarily determinative.” United States v. Bruce, 394 F.3d 1215, 1224 (9th Cir.2005) (quoting Broncheau, 597 F.2d at 1263); accord, United States v. Antelope, 430 U.S. 641, 646 n. 7 (1977).