Feds indict tribal jail escapees
Jim Maniaci
Diné Bureau
WINDOW ROCK — Federal indictments were issued Tuesday against
three men who allegedly overpowered a Window Rock jail guard and escaped
Sept. 14. Two were recaptured before midnight that day.
Authorities believe the one still at large, Merrill Singer, 39, of
Dennehotso Chapter, left the Navajo Reservation. Singer was among
a half-dozen men who in July walked out an unlocked back door at the
same jail , but five were captured shortly afterwards about one mile
away, and a few days later the other one surrendered at the Crownpoint
police station.
Singer was in custody on charges of criminal entry, burglary and escape.
He is described as 5 foot 6 inches tall, weighing 132 pounds with
brown eyes and hair. He has a tattoo on his left hand.
The other two men involved in the September escape are Leon Watson,
20, of St. Michaels Chapter and William Yellow, 26, of Kayenta Chapter.
Yellow was being held on charges of criminal trespass and criminal
damage and had pleaded not guilty.
Watson, held on a bench warrant and on charges of escape, criminal
damage and assault, also had just pleaded not guilty.
Navajo police recaptured the pair the same night in a home 3.5 miles
north of Navajo Route 7 on Red Lake Road.
The U.S. charges, filed in Phoenix in the U.S. District Court for
Arizona, are for kidnapping and aiding and abetting the crime. According
to Dorothy Fulton of the Navajo Criminal Investigations Department,
Detective Michael Henderson prepared the case for the U.S. Attorney's
Office.
This means the escapee will be in the National Crime Information Computer
system instead of just the tribal outstanding warrants system.
To escape in September two of the trio overpowered a 29-year-old detention
officer in the men's west wing serving cell when she returned with
more mops and cleaning items for Singer. Yellow allegedly grabbed
her from behind. Singer reportedly opened the back gate and the three
men left after changing from the bright orange jumpsuits issued to
inmates into their civilian clothes.
But the Navajo Department of Corrections officer managed to keep her
hand-held radio when they locked her in the solitary confinement cell,
and a Navajo officer on patrol in Window Rock heard her call for help
and raised the alarm a few minutes after the 5:30 a.m. escape. She
was not hurt physically in the struggle.
The officer was alone on duty at the time. Because of the construction
of the jail and the early time in the morning, no one heard the ruckus
raised by other prisoners trying to help the guard. Since the two
escapes the Department of Corrections has changed procedures.
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Chinle judge scolds DWIs, bootleggers
S.J. Ludescher
Staff Writer
CHINLE, Ariz. — Chinle District Court Judge Ray Gilmore, taking
a day off from the bench this week, scolded people convicted of driving
while intoxicated or bootlegging.
"I am 100 percent Navajo, and as such, I want to be 100 percent
free of alcohol," Gilmore said. "It's been introduced from
outside and we're suffering for it. Please, let's leave that stuff
alone. We want to help you so you can have a better life. Why not
start your new year and new millennium right now?"
The 45 people in his audience had been ordered to the gathering by
judges and parole and probation officers. The seminar is part of a
pilot program launched to deal with the high number of repeat violators.
Bootleggers may have been arrested for a first offense, but for those
found guilty of drunken driving, the appearance before Gilmore involved
a second, third or fourth violation. Some of the offenders had been
sentenced in Gilmore's court.
Efforts by Chinle law enforcement and task forces to clean up the
alcohol problem may be working. Bootlegging convictions are up, and
drunken driving violations are down.
Chinle judicial district statistics indicate 198 citations for bootlegging
had been adjudicated during 1998. In the first six months of 1999,
however, 108 had been heard. Statistics for drunken driving show 692
cases in 1998. Through the first six months of 1999, only 249 appeared
before a judge.
But Gilmore told the crowd those figures weren't good enough.
"Part of the law has a provision for impounding your car until
the fines and required rehabilitation are done," he said. "I
am seriously considering this. You shall not drive until you satisfy
the obligations of the law. The laws need to be enforced. No judge
is popular when he's doing his job."
Navajo Nation Peacemaker William Clay, invited by the judicial district
to speak to the group, said, "You are smart enough to create
your problem. You are smart enough to correct it."
Annie Kahn, a Navajo cultural teacher and speaker, also scolded the
offenders.
"There's something sacred about you. Find out what it is,"
she said.
Then Kahn directed her comments to the bootleggers.
"If you're a young person, you're desired by the whole community,"
she said. "You're good salesmen. There's beauty in that, but
not in what you're selling it's wrong. You're needed in this valley.
I want you in this valley. Clean up your act. You're too smart."
Kahn challenged the group to provide a better example for young people
and to return to the job of parenting.
"The children are home alone without guidance and protection,
and where are you? You brought these children into the world, and
you're supposed to protect them. There's no room for alcohol or pain
in this," she said.
Gilmore said he hoped to make the seminars a monthly occurrence, pulling
in different offenders each time. Through probation and parole records,
his office plans to track the results of the meetings and the number
of relapses.
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1960s civil rights worker, Indian activist
still fighting
Bill Donovan
Diné Bureau
GALLUP — She may not have the name recognition of Russell Means,
but LaDonna Harris has been fighting since the 1960s on behalf of
urban Indians and Indian women in fact, she says, for all minorities.
Harris, who spoke at the University of New Mexico-Gallup campus Wednesday,
talked about some of her experiences in the trenches of the American
Indian civil rights movement.
For example, Native American leaders have said for the past 30 years
that Richard Nixon probably did more to promote tribal sovereignty
within tribal governments than any other president before or since.
Why he did this has puzzled Indian leaders. And Harris said she, too,
has wondered why Nixon, a Republican who got rid of Democratic poverty
programs, spared those on Indian reservations.
Back in the early 1970s, she said, she was talking to Leon Garment,
one of Nixon's top advisers and legal counsel. If anyone knew, she
thought, he would.
When Nixon was growing up, Garment told Harris, he wasn't close to
his father. In fact, the only father figure and positive male influence
he had in his life, Garment said, was his coach, who was an Indian.
And that, Harris said, may be the reason Nixon decided to spare the
reservation poverty programs.
Harris, a member of the Commanche Nation, married a fellow Oklahoma
resident, Fred Harris, who would go on to become one of the country's
most respected senators in the 1970s and 1980s. They have since divorced.
She also has been a member of a number of federal and state boards
that looked into problems of minorities and civil rights.
"On many of these boards, I was the token Indian and even the
token woman," Harris said.
She also admitted she didn't fit well in Washington, D.C., when she
went there with her ex-husband. While other senators' wives were getting
together to wrap bandages and undertake other similar projects, Harris
found herself becoming a spokeswoman for Indian and minority causes.
For example, she remembers the day when one of her daughters came
to her at their Virginia home and pointed to efforts by the state
government to prosecute a man and woman for marrying outside their
race.
"At that time, it was illegal for someone who was white to marry
someone of black or Indian ancestry," Harris said.
She said her daughter pointed out that Harris was not legally married
to her Anglo husband under Virginia law.
"I got to thinking how dramatic it would be for the wife of a
senator to be dragged to jail, but fortunately, three weeks later,
the U.S. Supreme Court declared the state law to be unconstitutional,"
she said.
Today, as founder and president of the Americans for Indian Opportunity,
which is headquartered on New Mexico's Santa Ana Reservation, Harris
continues to work on behalf of tribal sovereignty and civil rights.
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Bestseller begins with rally
Book opens in Navajoland
By Bill Donovan
Staff Writer
GALLUP — As area volunteers make final plans for this weekend's
19th annual Gallup Balloon Rally, hundreds of thousands of people
throughout the United States are reading about it in Michael Crichton's
latest bestseller.
Crichton, whose works were the basis of movies like "Jurassic
Park" and the television hit, "E.R.," looks into time
travel in his latest book, "Timeline," which was published
last week.
The book begins when two of his characters find an old Navajo man
near Gallup and take him to the fictional McKinley County Trauma Center...
| Top |
City wants Fitzjerrell suit tossed
Sekai K. Mutunhu
Staff Writer
GALLUP — The City of Gallup has filed a motion to dismiss a wrongful
death lawsuit against the city, claiming that the complaint lacks
crucial factual information and that the city cannot be held liable
for the 1997 death of Paul Fitzjerrell because the two former police
officers involved in the incident were off-duty at the time.
According to the motion to dismiss, the complaint against the city
fails to state a cause of action under rules outlined in the New Mexico
Rules of Civil Procedure...
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Jail in Milan locked down after brawl
Staff Report
MILAN — The Corrections Corp. of America jail here was locked
down one day this week because of a fight in which one inmate was
cut with a knife.
However, rumors circulating in Grants and Milan concerning a riot
at the jail are untrue, jail warden Tom Newton said Wednesday...
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Builder says jail is sound
S.J. Ludescher
Staff Writer
GALLUP — The construction superintendent for the company that
built the McKinley County Adult Detention Center denied Wednesday
the jail was unsound.
"We're willing to stand by this building 110 percent," said
Chris Jackovich with Gerald Martin Construction during an inspection
of the facility. "It was inspected twice once by the county and
once by the state. And there's nothing deficient about it..."
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Navajo police reports
Jim Maniaci
Diné Bureau
WINDOW ROCK — Two house fires, an accidental shooting in which
an old rifle blew up, a hot-wired stolen tribal car chase and a lost
boy kept officers of the Window Rock Police District busy in recent
days.
Little boy safe
SANDERS A 9-year-old girl saw a 2-year-old boy wandering in a wash
around 4 p.m. Friday, but it took residents and authorities a while
to find the tot's parents and reunite them...
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Land-dispute change revolves around royalties
Jim Maniaci
Diné Bureau
WINDOW ROCK — The change in the federal Navajo-Hopi Land Settlement
Act that council delegates are being asked to approve today is a compromise
worked out among many parties.
Under the existing law which has been amended since it was enacted
in 1974, the tribe must select lands within 18 miles of the reservation
in New Mexico which would be placed in trust status. Under the changes
that the U.S. Congress will be asked to approve, the Navajo Nation
will select less land in the Eastern Agency but would gain in royalties
from coal, oil and gas...
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Tuba hearing draws few, offers little
George Hardeen
Special to the Independent
TUBA CITY, Ariz. — The idea was to hold a hearing to discuss
the 13 points of the Diné College reorganization plan and work
toward a consensus.
But there was no budget to review, no charts to see, no documentation
to read, no chronology to review, no copies of a recent survey opposing
the reorganization to consider, nor barely an audience to hear any
of it...
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