Leonard Peltier: Is He Guilty or Innocent?
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Leonard Peltier: Is he Guilty or Innocent?
American Indian rights activist Leonard Peltier is currently serving two consecutive life sentences in federal prison in Leavenworth, Kansas. Peltier is convicted for the shooting deaths of FBI Agents Jack R. Coler and Ronald A. Williams. Peltier claims he did not murder Agents Coler and Williams, but more important, Peltier and his defenders continue to assert his innocence by claiming they have ballistics tests to prove it. In addition to this, Peltiers defenders claim there was immoral and illegal conduct on the behalf of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) during his trial. Peltier is yet another example of the inherent inequalities minorities face when they are up against Americas judicial system.
Political Context of 1973-1975
For no perceptible reason, in the December snow of 1973 more than two hundred Indian men, women, and children were shot down by the United States Government on the Wounded Knee Reservation. Although there is no factual connection between the Wounded Knee Massacre and the murders of Agents Coler and Williams, the Indian factionalism that resulted from the Wounded Knee Massacre may have possibly contributed to the atmosphere of tension that existed on the Pine Ridge Reservation. The
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Pine Ridge ReservationЖdesperately poor and home to 10,000 Lakota SiouxЖwas a cauldron of violence, fear, and anxiety. More important though, by 1975 American
Indian Movement (AIM) members camped out at the Jumping Bull compound “were engaged in a full blown war between full-blood and mixed-blood residents of Pine Ridge” (Encyclopedia of World Biography 1). With support from the FBI and Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), mixed-blood Lakota Sioux were fighting to maintain power on the Pine Ridge Reservation. This period has been coined “the reign of terror” because over sixty Indians, including women and children, were murdered from May of 1973 through
June of 1975. Tension had increased on the reservation because the government did not “concern itself with the dozens of murders committed in the past three years on the reservation, almost none of which had ever been investigated, far less solved” (Matthiessen 193). During “the reign of terror”, the Pine Ridge Reservation had the highest per capita murder rate in the United States; Pine Ridge also had the highest ratio of FBI Agents to citizens in the United States.
Amidst this unstable environment Agents Coler and Williams met their deaths, execution-style. The deaths of Agents Coler and Williams created one of Americas most well-known political prisoners: Leonard Peltier.
Peltiers Version of Shootout
On June 26, 1975, FBI Agents Coler and Williams entered the Pine Ridge Reservation without proper jurisdiction in unmarked vehicles to arrest Jimmy Eagle, “whose offense, at worst, was the theft of a pair of cowboy boots from an old drinking
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buddy during a brawl” (Matthiessen 192). For reasons that are currently unclear, a gunfight broke out, and Agents Coler and Williams were murdered along with one Native American, Joe Stuntz. According to Peltier, upon hearing gunfire, he grabbed his shirt
and rifle and began running for the houses nearby where he feared the Jumping Bulls might be trappedЖfacing death. AIM members Bob Robideau and Norman Brown, who were present at the compound, claim Agents Coler and Williams fired first and they fired back. Others joined in, including Peltier. Coler was hit first in the arm, and later shot in the head. Williams, who put up his hand as if to ward off an attack, was shot through his hand into his head at close range. Although his death was never investigated, Joe Stuntz was killed in the crossfire. Robideau and Brown claim they did not know Coler and Williams were FBI Agents, Peltier knew the agents were law enforcement officials because Norman Charles and Joe Stuntz informed him that these agents had conversed with them about Eagle on the evening of June 25, 1975.
FBI Version of Shootout
Unlike Peltiers testimony, the FBI claims Peltier and Charles knew Agents Coler and Williams were law enforcement officials. According to the FBI, on the evening of June 25, 1975, Agents Williams and Coler were on the Pine Ridge Reservation attempting to locate and arrest Jimmy Eagle with an outstanding federal warrant charging
him with robbery and assault with a deadly weapon. The Agents were unsuccessful in their attempts to locate Eagle. Amidst this investigation, the Agents conversed with Norman Charles and Joe Stuntz in Agents Williams car and informed Charles and Stuntz
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that the purpose of their visit was to locate Eagle. Charles and Stuntz informed the Agents that Eagle had just left the reservation in a red vehicle; no further detail was given regarding the red vehicle.
On the morning of June 26, 1975 Agents Williams and Cole returned to the Pine Ridge Reservation to continue their attempts to locate Eagle. At approximately 11:50 a.m. FBI Agents overheard a radio transmission in which agent Williams informed Coler,
who was following him in another car that he had spotted a red and white vehicle that he was going to stop. “In the next radio transmission overheard, which was only a few seconds later, Williams stated that the vehicle they were pursuing had stopped, the occupants had exited the vehicle, and it appeared they were preparing to fire at the Agents” (minneapolis.fbi.gov/peltier 4). Leonard Peltier, Norman Charles, and Joe Stuntz were the occupants of the red and white vehicle that Williams and Coler attempted to stop. Supported by the testimony of Michael Anderson, “Leonard Peltiers red and white suburban entered the area of the murders first, followed shortly thereafter by Williams and Colers FBI vehicles. Peltiers vehicle stopped approximately 250 yards in front of the Agents cars. Peltier, Charles, and Stuntz got out and started firing at the Agents” (minneapolis.fbi.gov/peltier 5). In the last frantic radio transmission overheard,
Williams was giving directions to other Agents on how to get to his and Colers location. Williams warned Agent J.Gary Adams “if [he] didnt get there quick, [he and Coler] were
gonna be dead” (Encyclopedia of World Biography 3). Seconds