Peltier almost free!

AIM elder to be released Feb. 18

By JUAN ESPINOSA

On his last full day as president, Joe Biden commuted the life sentence of American Indian Movement leader Leonard Peltier, 80, who was convicted of killing two FBI agents in 1975.

Lenny Foster, Peltier’s spiritual advisor for more than 40 years, said in a telephone interview from his Arizona home that he was told early Jan. 20, while President Donald Trump’s inauguration was underway.

“We knew it was in the works,” Foster said. “Tribal leaders with the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) met with Biden. The effort was led by retired federal judge Kevin Sharp who represented Peltier in his bid for clemency.”

Foster said the NCAI includes over 50 Native American governments. “I submitted a petition asking for their support of Peltier at their annual meeting.”

Despite the commutation, Peltier is expected to be held on “house arrest” in Florida until Feb. 18 when he will be transported to his home in Minnesota,  according to Sharp. “The Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians have prepared a furnished home for him there,” he said.

In a statement, the NCAI said Peltier’s case has long symbolized the systemic injustices faced by Indigenous Peoples.

In the five decades since his conviction, Peltier has maintained his innocence. FBI agents Jack Cole and Ronald Williams were killed in a massive attack June 26, 1975 on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. The agents reportedly were searching for robbery suspect.

Initially, four Native people were charged with the agents’ murders. All but Peltier were set free.

 AIM denounced Peltier’s indictment, pointing out that the FBI had terrorized the reservation for months and that the people had a right to defend themselves, according to an August 1979 report in La Cucaracha.

“They believe Peltier was a victim of government harassment and was unjustly convicted by a government case which involved fabricated evidence and coerced testimony,” according to La Cucaracha.

Foster said Peltier’s defense committee has received messages of support from as far way as New Zealand and Australia, Europe, and Latin America. Reports of Peltier’s commutation has spread like a prairie fire, he said.

“They are aware that North America is indigenous land,” Foster said. “We don’t learn about that in American schools. My generation was born into the resistance. We have always had to react to racism. ”

In an account published by Native News Online, Peltier talked about his childhood. He said he was forcibly taken from his grandmother to a North Dakota boarding school when he was 9 years old. He wrote the staff “made it clear we were hated” at the school.

Foster, 77, has long been an advocate for Native American religious rights. “I testified before two U.S. Senate committees and we got the sweat lodge approved in prisons. Leonard is a symbols of that resistance — just like Geronimo, Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse.”

Both Foster and Peltier are longtime members of AIM who met in Denver in 1970. “I sundanced with him in 1975 at Crow Dog’s Paradise on the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota.

When Indigenous People regained the freedom of religion rights through the courts, Foster began his mission to reintroduce the sweat lodge to incarcerated inmates in prisons throughout the country. He says he has visited 93 state and federal prisons in numerous states and has had contact with more than 2,000 inmates.

In 1985, he went to Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary in Kansas and became Peltier’s spiritual advisor. For 40 years, Foster visited Peltier once every three months.

“I brought him the cleansing and purification ceremony of the sweat lodge,” Foster said. “My visits usually lasted six hours from 9 a.m. to 2:30 or 3 p.m. In the sweat lodge we pray, sing, smoke the pipe and then enjoy a meal afterwards.”

Foster is anxious to see his old friend again. Because of COVID, the federal prisons have restricted his visits. He has not seen Peltier in person since 2018. For most of the time since, Peltier has been in “lockdown,” or isolation.

“He’s 80 years old and he has been locked up for 50 years,” Foster said. “He needs to go home. He needs medical attention. He needs fresh air and sunlight to rejuvenate him.

In addition to being an accomplished artist, Peltier is well-read, intelligent and cares about his people, Foster said.