Posts Tagged ‘U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder’

26
Jun

One more crushing delay for Native Americans awaiting money from $3.4 billion Cobell settlement

   Posted by: admin    in Blackfeet, Cobell vs. Salazar, Elouise Cobell, Indian trust funds, Interior Department

Marietta Green works at the Blackfeet Eagle Shields Center for elders. The government, she says, “should not have committed fraud against my ancestors.” (Gwen Florio/Missoulian)

Marietta Green works at the Blackfeet Eagle Shields Center for elders. The government, she says, “should not have committed fraud against my ancestors.” (Gwen Florio/Missoulian)

I went up to the Blackfeet Reservation this week to talk to people there about the Cobell case settlement. When I went, on Wednesday, the Senate was preparing to debate a jobs bill that contained approval for the $3.4 billion settlement for Indian people defrauded by the U.S. government of royalties on their land. It seemed that, after generations of being shorted, people might finally get some of the money owed them. A day later, the jobs bill seemed dead and the settlement was once again up in the air – all of which underscored the resignation voiced by the people with whom I spoke for this story:

    BROWNING, Mont. – Frank Still Smoking is 76, an age where he’s seen a lot of his contemporaries pass on.

    They died, he believes, without receiving justice – in the form of money due them from the U.S. government for mismanaging royalty payments on tribal lands to the tune of billions of dollars over several generations.

    This particular injustice might have been added to the seemingly endless list of offenses by the government against Indian people had it not been for the work of Elouise Cobell, who, like Still Smoking, is a member of the Blackfeet Nation.

    Fourteen years ago, Cobell sued the government, demanding compensation for the hundreds of thousands of Native Americans defrauded of their money.

    In December, after repeated setbacks, a $3.4 billion settlement in Cobell v. Salazar was announced. It was described as one of the largest class-action lawsuits in history. Indian Country celebrated.

    And then – nothing.

    The settlement, which needs congresssional approval before the money can be distributed, has faced one delay after another, most recently on Thursday night, when Senate Republicans used a filibuster to kill the jobs bill to which the settlement was attached.

    “It’s just a wait-and-see game now,” a weary-sounding Cobell said in a telephone interview Friday. “We were so disappointed and disheartened this didn’t get approved because it affects so many people’s lives.”

    In Browning, 2,200 miles away from the political power games in Washington, Still Smoking wonders if he’ll end up like his friends, dead before he ever sees a penny of the money due him.

As always, we’ll keep posting updates as the settlement progresses – or not. Someday, someday soon, we hope to write that people are actually getting their money. In the meantime, we’ll try to be patient, too.

Gwen Florio

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11
Jun

Legal Times – Cobell case showdown!

   Posted by: admin    in Cobell vs. Salazar, Elouise Cobell, Indian trust funds, Interior Department

That’s how Legal Times describes what’s at stake in the historic Indian trust class-action case, which still awaits approval by the U.S. Senate of a $3.4 billion settlement.

The court-mandated congressional approval has been repeatedly delayed, with the latest deadline set for next week. It looks as though Senate approval could hinge on legal fees. As Legal Times summarizes it, here:

Elouise Cobell (AP photo)

Elouise Cobell (AP photo)

    Lawyers in the case, named for lead plaintiff Elouise Cobell, agreed to cap fees at $100 million. Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) is proposing to set the cap at $50 million, and he introduced an amendment (PDF) this week to do so.

    Senators could vote on the amendment as soon as next week, or they might not consider it at all. A spokeswoman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said today that no agreement has been reached.

    In a statement, Barrasso said his amendment would benefit the plaintiffs, who lost royalty funds they were entitled to from the use of natural resources on Indian land. “After hearing from both sides to the lawsuit and Indian country, I believe the agreement can be strengthened in a way that benefits individuals, Indian Country, and taxpayers,” he said.

Both Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Attorney General Eric Holder have written to oppose Barrasso’s move. And Cobell, who is Blackfeet from Montana, supports the $100 million cap.

Gwen Florio

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4
May

Three new federal attorneys to fight violent crime on Montana’s Indian reservations

   Posted by: admin    in Indian reservations, Law and Order, Native women, U.S. Department of Justice

Here’s the entire story from the Associated Press:

(Image from SpruceRun.net)

(Image from SpruceRun.net)

BILLINGS (AP) – The U.S. attorney’s office for the District of Montana has received funding for three new assistant U.S. attorney positions to prosecute crime on Indian reservations.

In 2009, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., launched an initiative on public safety and victim services in tribal communities. The Justice Department received federal funding for Fiscal Year 2010 to increase the number of prosecutors for cases involving violent crime on Indian reservations.

On Monday, Montana’s office learned it was receiving funding to hire three more assistant U.S. attorneys.

U.S. Attorney Michael Cotter says the allocation is another step in his office’s efforts to support tribal justice systems, meet federal law enforcement responsibilities and address violence against Native American women and children.

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11
Jan

“Unacceptable tide of domestic and sexual violence” – Feds order crackdown in crime on Indian reservations

   Posted by: admin    in Bureau of Indian Affairs, Law and Order, Native women


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Here’s the entire story from Devlin Barrett of the Associated Press:

(SpruceRun.net image)

(SpruceRun.net image)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department on Monday ordered prosecutors in 33 states to step up their efforts to combat persistently high violent crime on Indian reservations, particularly offenses against women and children.

Attorney General Eric Holder was to announce the initiative after his deputy, David Ogden, issued a memo to federal prosecutors in those areas instructing them to do more to fight tribal crime — a problem the Justice Department has long been accused of ignoring.

Ogden’s memo also said 47 new prosecutors and FBI personnel will be assigned to handle such crimes.

On tribal lands, federal officials are usually responsible for prosecuting serious crimes. While the nationwide crime rate continues to fall, statistics show American Indians are the victims of violent crime at more than twice the national rate — and some tribes have murder rates against women 10 times greater than the national average.

Often, law enforcement on reservations is stretched thin across wide geographic areas.

Still, little is known about what exactly is happening on reservations or how the incidents are handled. Data has been sparse for decades and crime surveys rarely separate out tribal statistics.

Ogden wrote in the memo that the new demands being placed on prosecutors will help make reservations safer “and turn back the unacceptable tide of domestic and sexual violence there.”

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