Soboba Band

NYTs Article on Soboba Band Conflicts

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

From the NYTs:

SAN JACINTO, Calif. — With 9 reservations and 10 casinos, Riverside County is a major center of Indian gambling in California.

But a standoff between county sheriff’s deputies and leaders of the Soboba Band of Luiseño Indians has led to an unusual effort to close one of the casinos because of safety concerns.

Three Soboba members were killed in gunfights with deputies on the reservation in May, and the authorities say tribal members have shot at deputies in patrol cars and helicopters with high-powered assault rifles over the past nine months.

In July, citing what it called heavy-handed treatment by the Sheriff’s Department, the tribe began requiring deputies entering the reservation to check in at a security gate and travel with an escort. Sheriff Stanley Sniff says the restrictions are illegal and has asked the National Indian Gaming Commission to close the Soboba casino and suspend the tribe’s gambling license.

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LA Times on Soboba Killings

Matthew L.M. Fletcher1 Comment

From the LA Times. An excerpt:

San Jacinto Mayor Jim Ayres and the City Council asked the tribe to withdraw an application to annex more than 500 acres of land for a hotel and casino complex until the violence is quelled.

But Salgado, 65, is having none of it.

No one, he says, has the right to tell Indians how to run their sovereign nations.

“Why didn’t Stone come to me man to man and say that? And who is the mayor of San Jacinto to tell us what to do?” he asked. “Where were these people when we had nothing? Now that we are self-sufficient, it makes them fearful.”