Famous allies advocate for Leonard Peltier’s freedom. The FBI and a group of former agents push back. Part 2
Part 2: The trial of Leonard Peltier
A five-week jury trial was held in U.S. District Court in Fargo, N.D., and Leonard Peltier was convicted on April 18, 1977 of two counts of first-degree murder. He was sentenced on June 1, 1977 to serve two consecutive life terms in prison.
Peltier appealed his conviction to the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals and his conviction was upheld in 1978. A Writ of Certiorari was denied by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1979.
He has tried numerous times to obtain his release through multiple filings. All failed.
The U.S. Parole Commission provided Peltier a full reconsideration parole hearing in 1998 but denied him parole. Repeated efforts have all been denied, and a civil suit filed against the FBI and a current and former director also went nowhere. The U.S. Supreme Court has twice declined to hear his case.
Peltier had one last run at freedom. On July 20, 1979, three inmates — Peltier, Bobby Garcia and Dallas Thundershield escaped from the federal penitentiary in Lompoc, California. Garcia was quickly recaptured and Thundershield was shot and killed by guards.
Peltier remained on the loose for three days until a farmer reported chasing an armed man out of melon field who demanded his wallet, shoes and the key to his pickup at the point of a Ruger Mini-14 rifle. He drove away at a high rate of speed on a rough road, damaging the truck’s transmission. Peltier fled on foot but sheriff’s deputies arrived and caught him hiding in a tree.
He was convicted of the escape and of being a felon in possession of a firearm, and the conviction was affirmed on appeal. That added another seven years to his sentence.
Peltier said he should be released at once.
“I’ve been exonerated now,” he claims, pointing to government officials, lawyers and judges who now believe he was wrongfully convicted.
Don Edwards, who was an FBI special agent and naval intelligence and gunnery officer before serving 32 years as a congressman from California, called for Peltier to be released in 2000.
Edwards, who died at the age of 100 in 2015, chaired the House Subcommittee on Civil and Constitutional Rights and had a special interest in Peltier’s case.
“Granting clemency to Mr. Peltier should not be viewed as expressing any disrespect for the current agents or leadership of the FBI, nor would it represent any condoning of the killings,” he said in a statement released in December 2000. “Instead, clemency … would recognize past wrongdoing and the undermining of the government’s case since trial … It would serve as a crucial step in the reconciliation and healing between the U.S. Government and Native Americans.”
Peltier said he hopes the sheer weight of evidence that he was wrongfully convicted will earn him his freedom.
There has been debate over the weapon used to kill the agents and if it can be tied to Peltier. Like most matters, the two sides disagree strongly, with the FBI insisting an AR-15 rifle recovered from Peltier’s associates in Wichita, Kan., on Sept. 10, 1975, can be linked to him.
The AR-15 was discovered after a station wagon blew up on the Kansas Turnpike after explosives were placed too close to the tailpipe. The vehicle was loaded with multiple weapons, including a burned-up AR-15 — and Agent Coler’s .308 rifle.
Robert Robideau, Norman Charles, and Michael Anderson, all of whom were tied to the shooting of the agents and all colleagues of Peltier, were in the station wagon.
The FBI claims Peltier was the only person at the scene of the 1975 shooting who was carrying an AR-15. Peltier said the “evidence” against him has been manipulated and manufactured.
“First of all, I’m not guilty,” he said. “I’m in prison illegally. That’s why people call me a political prisoner.”
Over the decades, he has found support from a wide variety of high-profile people, including Pope Francis, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Mother Teresa, Nelson Mandela, the Dali Lama, Coretta Scott King, Jesse Jackson, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and actors Marlon Brando, Robert Redford and Harry Belanfonte.
On Nov. 6, 2017, several famous musicians, Kris Kristofferson, Jamey Johnson, Arlo Guthrie, Rita Coolidge, Shooter Jennings, Joe Ely, Jessi Colter, The Doors’ John Densmore, performed at a benefit concert for Peltier in Tulsa, Okla. Video messages from Peter Gabriel, Tom Morello and Steven Van Zandt were played.
Over the years, other famous musicians, including Willie Nelson, Bonnie Raitt, Jackson Browne and Rage Against The Machine, have rallied to his side and performed benefit concerts on Peltier’s behalf.
Seven senators — Tina Smith, Mazie K. Hirono, Patrick Leahy, Edward J. Markey, Bernie Sanders, Brian Schatz and Elizabeth Warren — called for clemency for Peltier, who has been in custody for 47 years after being convicted of first-degree murder for the deaths of FBI Special Agents Jack R. Coler and Ronald A. Williams at Pine Ridge on June 25, 1975.
Over the years, other prominent figures, including Pope Francis, Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, Saint Mother Teresa, Nelson Mandela, the Dali Lama and Coretta Scott King, also support his release.
On Feb. 4, 2022, Sen. Leahy, D-VT, urged Biden to order Peltier released.
“I urge President Biden to commute Leonard Peltier’s prison sentence and release him from federal prison,” said Leahy, then the senior member of the Senate. He retired in January after 48 years in office.
“Peltier, a prominent Native American activist, was imprisoned for crimes he and many other legal experts and advocates maintain he never committed,” he said. “His trial was so riddled with flaws that even one of the prosecutors trying him has acknowledged that Peltier was wrongfully convicted. Peltier, now 77 years old and ailing with multiple health problems, has served more than 44 years in federal prison.”
The statement said Peltier “is exactly the kind of individual who should be considered for clemency,” since he “knows firsthand just how imperfect” the American criminal justice can be at times.
“I have long believed that pardons and commutations are vital tools to offer clemency and relief, particularly when our criminal justice system has been contorted to propagate injustices,” Leahy said. “I call on President Biden to commute Mr. Peltier’s sentence expeditiously. It is the right thing to do.”
Sen. Schatz of Hawaii, the chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, sent Biden a letter in 2022 calling on him to order Peltier released.
“Mr. Peltier meets appropriate criteria for commutation: (1) his old age and critical illness, (2) the amount of time he has already served, and (3) the unavailability of other remedies,” he wrote. “Mr. Peltier should be granted a commutation of his sentence.”
A White House spokesperson responded to the website HuffPost when asked if the matter was under consideration.
“We are aware of Mr. Peltier’s request for a pardon and the outreach in support of his request,” the spokesperson said. “As many of you know, President Biden has a process for considering all requests for pardon or commutation, which is run through our White House Counsel’s Office. I don’t have more to share on Mr. Peltier’s request at this time.”
On Sept. 12, Peltier’s 79th birthday, a large group of activists and Indigenous leaders rallied outside the White House, urging President Biden to grant him clemency. Drums pounded out a steady beat as voices called out to Biden: “Free Peltier. Free Peltier.”
A statement from him was read.
"I hope to breathe free air before I die. Hope is a hard thing to hold, but no one is strong enough to take it from me," Peltier wrote. "There is a lot of work left to do. I would like to get out and join you in doing it."
"Forty-eight years is long enough," said Nick Tilsen, president of Rapid City-based NDN Collective, an Indigenous-led advocacy group that co-organized the rally with Amnesty International USA. “We are calling on the Biden administration, who has made it a choice — has made Indigenous civil rights a priority — for his administration, yet he allows and continues to allow the longest incarcerated political prisoner in the United States," Tilsen said.
Over 100 people journeyed by bus and caravan for three days from South Dakota to the District of Columbia to support Peltier's release, NDN Collective said in a Facebook post. Speakers at the rally included "Reservation Dogs" actor Dallas Goldtooth, president of the National Congress of American Indians Fawn Sharp and other Indigenous leaders.
The rally was met with resistance from law enforcement, and 35 people, including National Congress of American Indians President Fawn Sharp, Nick Tilson, CEO of the Rapid City-based NDN Collective CEO Nick Tilson, Amnesty International USA Executive Director Paul O’Brien, Chris White Eagle, Hermus Betteyoun and Goldtooth were cited for blocking a sidewalk and issued $50 fines.
The FBI pushed back against efforts to release Peltier in an email to the Associated Press.
"Peltier intentionally and mercilessly murdered these two young men and has never expressed remorse for his ruthless actions," the FBI said, adding that the conviction “has withstood numerous appeals to multiple courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court.”
Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, the first Native American to head a cabinet department, advocated for Peltier’s release when she was a congresswoman from New Mexico.
“Congress hasn't weighed in on this issue in years,” Haaland posted on social media in 2020, citing concerns about COVID-19. “At 75 with chronic health issues, it is urgent that we #FreeLeonardPeltier.”
Al Scudieri of Tampa, Fla., a former president of the Society of Former Special Agents of the FBI, wants Peltier to remain behind prison walls.
“I, and just about every other former and current agent with whom I have spoken about Peltier, are vehemently opposed to his release,” Scudieri said. “However, I am aware of a few notable exceptions.”
He actively participated in the murder investigation, but said he does not believe he has any unique insight into the matter; but he has collected a number of photographs and news clips from that time.
As Scudieri noted, not all former agents believe Peltier should remain behind bars.
Former FBI Special Agent Coleen Rowley, who retired from the bureau in 2004, wrote a letter to President Joe Biden in December urging him to grant Peltier clemency. In addition to her work as an agent, Rowley was a legal counsel in the Minneapolis FBI division for 14 years and worked with prosecutors and agents who investigated the 1975 murders.
“Retribution seems to have emerged as the primary if not sole reason for continuing what looks from the outside to have become an emotion-driven ‘FBI Family’ vendetta,” Rowley wrote. She shared the letter with The Guardian, a major British newspaper.
“The focus of my two cents leading to my joining the call for clemency is based on Peltier’s inordinately long prison sentence and an ever more compelling need for simple mercy due to his advanced age and deteriorating health. Enough is enough. Leonard Peltier should now be allowed to go home.”
Rowley, 68, said new agents are told the FBI’s version of the story, which she said might not be completely accurate. Rowley has been critical of the FBI for its role in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks upon America.
She wrote a letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller and testified before a Senate committee and the 9/11 Commission, saying the bureau had been incompetent or worse before the attacks.
In 2002, Time magazine named Rowley and fellow whistleblowers Sherron Watkins from Enron and Cynthia Cooper of Worldcom as joint recipients of its Person of the Year award. Rowley ran for Congress from Minnesota as a member of the DFL Party, the state version of the Democratic Party, in 2006.
She said she isn’t sure what happened at Pine Ridge in 1975, but doubts few really know the whole story.
“The facts are murky, and I’m not going to say either narrative is correct. I wasn’t there. But I do know that if you really care about justice, then the real issue now is mercy, truth and reconciliation. To keep this going for almost 50 years really shows the level of vindictiveness the organisation has for Leonard Peltier,” Rowley told The Guardian. “The bottom line is there are all kinds of problems in the intelligence service which by and large never get corrected for the same reasons: group conformity, pride and an unwillingness to admit mistakes so systemic problems are covered up and never fixed.”
Seven Democratic senators — Tina Smith, Mazie K. Hirono, Patrick Leahy, Edward J. Markey, Bernie Sanders, Brian Schatz and Elizabeth Warren — are calling for clemency for Peltier.
But there has been little apparent movement in the effort to gain his freedom. I reached out to President Biden’s press office as well as Elizabeth G. Oyer, who serves as the pardon attorney who reviews requests for clemency, and the FBI. There was no response from any of the offices.
Peltier is no fan of President Biden, and thinks his son Hunter has received special treatment despite his struggles with drug addiction and illegal acts. He is a fan of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the son and nephew of Democratic Party icons Robert and John Kennedy.
He dismisses former President Donald Trump as a “fascist pig” and a “sicko.”
Requests for comments were sent to Sens. John Thune and Mike Rounds, Rep. Dusty Johnson and Gov. Kristi Noem, since the FBI agents were killed in South Dakota. None of the public officials responded.
Tom Lawrence has written for several newspapers and websites in South Dakota and other states and contributed to The New York Times, NPR, The Telegraph, The Daily Beast and other media outlets.
