Clemency at last! A prosecutor admits he was wrong. A story that spans 3 centuries
This is the story behind the story of President Biden’s decision to release from prison a man who received two consecutive life sentences for two murders committed a half-century ago.
The story behind the story spans three centuries of American history.
It is a story of massacre, injustice, cold-blooded murder, and racism.
It also may be one of the longest-running pursuits of presidential action to overturn a prison sentence.
Leonard Peltier was convicted in 1977 of the murder of two FBI agents on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota two years earlier. He has been in Federal prison ever since. Efforts to gain a Presidential pardon or clemency for him began in 1993 and have dragged on through five presidencies.
President Clinton reportedly was ready to do it as he left office in 2001. But two of the top public officials in South Dakota at that time independently asked Clinton not to do it.
Senator Tom Daschle, a South Dakota Democrat, and the Senate Majority Leader, urged Clinton not to do it. “I’m opposed to a pardon of Leonard Peltier and have always been opposed. That is what I shared with him (Clinton),” Daschle recalled in a meeting with the Argus Leader editorial board a week before the end of Clinton’s term. Meanwhile, South Dakota’s four-term Republican governor, Bill Janklow, said he flew to Washington to discuss the case with Clinton the month before Clinton’s presidency came to an end. “I am the one who’s responsible for Leonard Peltier not getting out,” Janklow said in an interview about two weeks after the end of Clinton’s presidency.
President Biden issued the following statement this week about his decision to release Peltier, now 80, to home custody for the remainder of his life:
“Tribal Nations, Nobel Peace laureates, former law enforcement officials (including the former U.S. Attorney whose office oversaw Mr. Peltier’s prosecution and appeal), dozens of lawmakers, and human rights organizations strongly support granting Mr. Peltier clemency, citing his advanced age, illnesses, his close ties to and leadership in the Native American community, and the substantial length of time he has already spent in prison,” the statement said.
More to come regarding the former U.S. attorney who has switched sides in the Peltier case.
135 years of Indian history in the U.S.
The Peltier story begins almost 70 years before Peltier was born with the legendary Indian Chief, Sitting Bull, whose people, the Hunkpapa Lakota Sioux, were driven from their reservation in the Black Hills of South Dakota in 1876 by white settlers drawn to the Hills by the discovery of gold.
With dreamed-of fortunes in gold suddenly on the horizon on Indian Reservation land in western South Dakota, the U.S. government decided to move the Indians of the Black Hills out of the way to more remote Indian territory.
However, led by Sitting Bull, many of the Black Hills Indians resisted. In June 1876, Sitting Bull and many of his supporters had gathered in retreat near the Little Big Horn River in Southern Montana about 300 miles northwest of the Black Hills. The U.S. Army, in full pursuit of the Indians, arrived on June 25 led by Lt. Col. George Custer.
The Indians were armed and ready. Within two days, five of Custer’s 12 companies, about 60 men each, had been wiped out. Custer was dead, along with two of his brothers, a brother-in-law, and a nephew. It would go down in history as Custer’s Last Stand.
Sitting Bull and part of his band fled into Canada. Ultimately, he was extradited to the U.S. to be held prisoner at the Standing Rock Reservation on the west side of the Missouri River straddling the North Dakota-South Dakota border. In 1885, he was given travel privileges and worked in Buffalo Bill Cody’s traveling Wild West Show for several years.
In 1889, the Indians of this region became fascinated with a solar eclipse and were convinced if they performed a ritual dance, the white man would vanish. The movement spread and Sitting Bull joined in it. Federal officials became concerned about the possibility of a widespread Indian uprising, possibly led by Sitting Bull.
On December 15, 1890, 40 U.S. Indian police officers were sent to arrest Sitting Bull at his home on the Standing Rock reservation. Gunfire began as they arrived and within minutes, six police officers were dead and two more mortally wounded. Sitting Bull also was dead along with several of his supporters.
The 400 Sioux at Standing Rock then fled, heading back down toward the Black Hills. The 7th Calvary was sent in pursuit of them. They caught up with the Sioux at Wounded Knee in southwest South Dakota. The soldiers attempted to disarm the Indians. A fight erupted. An officer ordered his troops to begin firing. The Indians began falling. Two massive cannons also opened fire on the full Indian camp. Hundreds of Indians – men, women, and children – were fatally wounded.
Wounded Knee, where the Indians were buried in a mass grave and a memorial was erected nearby, would become a horrific event to be remembered by generations of Indians. Some considered it the final turning point in the Indian wars of the 1800s; the wars were over, the Indians lost. For many Indians it also marked the beginning of a new era they would come to despise, an era in which they felt that their rich culture could not be openly expressed or practiced; it had to be self-suppressed.
Spin forward to 1973. About 200 Indian activists returned to Wounded Knee. Their goal was to draw attention to the deplorable conditions at the Pine Ridge Reservation, which encompasses Wounded Knee, the mass grave, and the monument to the dead. The activists seized control of the area and held it for 71 days in open daily conflict with Federal law enforcement authorities, primarily to the FBI. The conflict between the Indian activists and the FBI continued on one level or another for at least four years. In a sense, the FBI was virtually at war with the Indian community in Western South Dakota. It is hard to say which group hated the other more.
And then, on June 26, 1975, two young FBI agents were following a red-and-white Chevrolet Suburban on a gravel road on the Pine Ridge Reservation in connection with a crime that has been portrayed over the years both as a robbery and as the theft of a pair of cowboy boots. In any case, suddenly, multiple rifles opened fire on them, some of them from elevated positions. The two agents, Ronald A. Williams, 27, and Jack Coler, 28, were seriously wounded, then killed with a high-power rifle firing bullets to the head.
Ultimately, Leonard Peltier, an Indian activist in his early 30s, who had fled to Canada, was extradited, charged, tried, and convicted of the murders. Two other suspects were arrested and tried but acquitted. Another was freed for lack of evidence.
Peltier contended over the years that although he shot at the two men that day, he did not fire the bullets that took their lives. He said he knew who did but would not identify him. Pointing at another to take blame with no hard proof is not the right thing to do in some cultures.
And there you have it. Over the years, 22 federal judges and the U.S. Supreme Court have reviewed aspects of the case, but Peltier remains in prison. He has major health issues, including diabetes and heart problems. He uses a walker. He has suffered from lock jaw acquired when he was a child and stepped on a rusty nail. No tetanus shot. At one point while in prison, his jaw locked, leaving his mouth open by 13 millimeters. He underwent a five-hour surgery at the Mayo Clinic, which was only partly successful.
Years-long effort for clemency succeeds as prosecutor switches sides
The list of those who have appealed for clemency for Peltier includes Nobel Peace Prize Winners Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandella, Pope Francis, the Dalai Lama, and Mother Theresa. Amnesty International has classified Peltier as a political prisoner and asked for his release. A group of 120 Tribal leaders from throughout the U.S. signed a statement asking for clemency about a week ago.
The most compelling argument for clemency, however, may have been the letter Biden referenced in announcing the clemency action. The letter came from James H. Reynolds, the former U.S. Attorney whose office oversaw Peltier’s original prosecution as well as the appeal following his conviction.
“Leonard Peltier’s conviction and continued incarceration is a testament to a time and a system of justice that no longer has a place in our society,” Reynolds wrote, adding that “attitudes about Native Americans” have changed dramatically since the Peltier trial.
“With time, and the benefit of hindsight,” Reynolds continued, “I have realized that the prosecution and continued incarceration of Mr. Peltier was and is unjust. We were not able to prove that Mr. Peltier personally committed any offense on the Pine Ridge Reservation.”
He added that in the end, Peltier was found guilty “simply because he was present with a weapon at the Reservation that day.”
Peltier’s prison term was delivered “on the basis of minimal evidence, a result that I strongly doubt would be upheld in any court today,” he wrote.
Biden’s clemency action came in the final hours of his presidency.
Peltier is to be released to his family in North Dakota on February 18.
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Thanks for reading, Cheryl. There are so many fine reporters and writers in IWC now that I feel fortunate whenever one of the other writers reads my work.
This was long overdue.