School board hopefuls get petition break
Jim Maniaci
Diné Bureau
WINDOW ROCK — Navajo Nation officials have taken steps to make
it easier for people running for election to reservation school boards
next year.
Although candidates will still have to get voters to sign nominating
petitions, Navajo election officials say they will check only to see
whether the candidate has filed the minimum number of signatures required
by law.
They will not as they do in all other elections have election personnel
check make sure the name on the petition matches the census number,
address and everything else on file.
In previous elections, this checking has resulted in anywhere from
30 to 50 percent of the names being rejected.
But before candidates begin thinking they don't have to worry about
the validity of the signatures they gather, they should be aware the
board will check those names if there is a challenge.
Richie Nez, director of the Navajo Election Administration, said the
challenger will have to identify each name that is being questioned
before further verification is done. Election workers will then have
30 days to verify whether the challenged names are valid.
For the November 2000 school board election, both the Education Committee
of the Navajo Nation Council and the Navajo Board of Election Supervisors
accepted the rules for staggered terms. School board candidates will
be given a position, with the odd-numbered positions being for four-year
terms and even-numbered positions for two-year terms.
Terms of even-numbered candidates will expire on Nov. 1, 2002.
All Navajo school board members elected in 1998 are serving two-year
terms so that no one will be cut short by the changeover.
Each of the 65 Navajo school boards has four to seven members, depending
upon the school's enrollment. The deadline to file a nominating petition
will be 90 days before a primary or whatever date the board determines
for other elections.
Supervisors also voted to grant an extension to the filing deadline
when no one files for the office or where none of the nominees has
gathered the minimum number of signatures for their petitions.
The board also decided that candidates will be allowed to carry forward
into the extension period the signatures already gathered.
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Shooting spree in Tuba nets 16 years
Diné Bureau
GALLUP — A Tuba City, Ariz., man received more than 16 years
in federal prison for taking part in a shooting spree last January
in which another Tuba City resident was severely injured.
Calvin Nez Jr., 26, pleaded guilty to two counts of attempted robbery
and one firearm count, receiving 80 months for the first offense and
120 months on the second. The two sentences will run consecutively.
On Jan. 9, Nez and three other co-defendants devised a plan to rob
a number of stores and residences in the south Tuba City area.
During one of the attempted robberies, federal prosecutors said, a
co-defendant, using Nez's gun, attempted to shoot someone in one of
the city's houses, but the gun misfired. While fleeing from that robbery,
four shots were fired at nearby residents who were coming to the assistance
of the victim.
In the course of another robbery, Nez shot a resident of the city
at close range. The man, who was sitting in his car with his wife,
is still recovering from the life-threatening injuries inflicted by
Nez, prosecutors said.
Later that day, tribal police tracked Nez to his home, where he was
arrested. Police were also able to recover the gun used in the shooting.
"As this case demonstrates," said Jos de Jesus Rivera, U.S.
attorney for Arizona, "we aggressively prosecute anyone who threatens
the safety of the community and the sanctity of a person's home."
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Two charged in slaying of officer
Jim Maniaci
Diné Bureau
WINDOW ROCK — Authorities in Flagstaff have charged a father
and son in connection with the murder of a White Mountain Apache police
officer.
Frank Monte Banashley Jr., 18, and his father, Frank Banashley Sr.,
38, both of Whiteriver, also were charged Friday in federal court
with discharging a 9 mm handgun. If convicted in federal court in
Phoenix on the murder charges, both men could be sentenced to death,
authorities said.
The two were charged with killing a White Mountain Apache
deputy. Tenny Gatewood Jr., 38, of Hon Dah was killed Thursday while
patrolling in a remote, wooded area of the eastern Arizona reservation.
Guided by Apache tribal game and fish wardens and covered from the
air by an Arizona Department of Public Safety helicopter, a seven-member
Apache County Sheriff's Office team bolstered by an FBI agent captured
Frank Banashley Sr. without resistance early Friday morning.
Apache County Sheriff Brian Hounshell on Sunday praised the White
Mountain Apache Tribe's Game and Fish Department.
"There's no way we could have gotten in there in that rugged
terrain without them. We didn't know the terrain. We really appreciate
them leading us there," Hounshell said.
Authorities knew the older man's exact location, because an Arizona
DPS helicopter equipped with special infrared-seeking devices found
a small campfire. The sheriff said it was camouflaged under trees
on a small ledge in a steep canyon.
The senior Banashley still had one handcuff on him,
and it is believed Gatewood managed to injure him in the right side
of the neck with a flesh wound from his gun, the sheriff said. Ted
Quasula, of the Office of Indian Law Enforcement for the Bureau of
Indian Affairs in Albuquerque, said the elder Banashley's wound was
in the shoulder.
Gatewood, the first member of his department to be killed
in the line of duty, died shortly before noon Thursday while making
a traffic stop on a pickup truck on a remote road near Hawley Lake
after investigating the burglary of beer from a convenience store.
Gatewood, a nine-year veteran of the department, stopped a vehicle
that matched the description of one used in the beer burglary at a
convenience store.
Gatewood struggled with the two suspects and was shot
in the head with his own handgun. The suspects, who fled on foot,
were arrested after a helicopter spotted two separate campfires a
couple of miles from the shooting scene. While in court Friday, the
elder Banashley told the federal magistrate that he was a Salt River
Pima who had lived most of his life in the Whiteriver area and worked
as a logger, The Arizona Daily Sun reported Saturday.
The younger Banashley told the court he had turned 18 in October,
had a 10th grade education and was expecting a child soon. He, too,
worked as a logger, and his mother is Navajo, the newspaper said.
According to a report by FBI Special Agent Kim Kelly,
the son acknowledged entering the convince store and taking a six
pack of soda. He reported seeing his father kick open the door and
walk out with several packs of beer.
Later after Gatewood pulled over their truck, the son
said his father stepped out of the vehicle and then a scuffle ensued
as the officer started to handcuff him.
The son reported hearing a gunshot, and then his father
called out for help. The son reportedly ran around the truck and pushed
the officer face down onto the ground, the newspaper said.
Then the father wrested the pistol away from Gatewood and began hitting
him with a rock. Then, using the officer's own gun, he fired a shot
into the officer's head, The Sun reported.
When interviewed, the father related similar events
in the shooting, including the fact that he struck the officer several
times in the head with a rock and fired a shot into his head. Gatewood
had radioed for backup, but the additional officers found him on the
ground, dead, when they arrived a few minutes later.
The truck was found about a mile away, still in the
southwestern part of Apache County on the Fort Apache Indian Reservation.
Hounshell said darkness forced a halt to the search
for Gatewood's killers. The Apache County Sheriff's Office team was
following tracks in a wash below the incident when it was pulled out
to avoid ambush and missing tracks.
According to the sheriff, his team also entered two homes of five
or six possible suspects, but came up empty Thursday night.
Only an hour after the state's helicopter was in the air, it spotted
the elder Banashley's campfire around 3 a.m., he said.
At first, the ACSO team bolstered by an FBI agent wanted to go over
the wall f the canyon, but it was too steep, a 200-foot drop, and
the officers and agent wouldn't have been able to reach their suspect,
the sheriff said.
Then the tribal game and fish wardens, who know the
rough terrain intimately, guided them around the long way, staging
the team and some top officials as close as possible without alerting
the fugitive.
After an hour's rest, the team moved in for the capture as the helicopter
swooped down from above to cover them.
The younger Banashley apparently stumbled into a roadblock, also early
Friday.
The sheriff praised the interdepartmental cooperation of all of the
agencies involved.
At the request of White Mountain Apache Tribal Chairman Dallas Massey,
the sheriff sent as much help as he could.
He stripped his department's manpower to the bone, marshaling 27 of
his 44 commissioned officers and commanders to aid the massive manhunt
directed by White Mountain Chief Raymond Burnette.
The neighboring Navajo County Sheriff's Office also sent more than
a dozen deputies to the aid of the White Mountain police.
The Navajo Nation Police Department sent a sergeant and five officers
to help.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
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Gallup man dies from stab wounds
Zarana Sanghani
Staff Writer
GALLUP — A 35-year-old Gallup man died after he was stabbed in
the stomach during a dispute Saturday night.
Vincent Toni was taken to Gallup Indian Medical Center
by friends and pronounced dead at 9:11 p.m.
Patrick Beard, 26, was charged with voluntary manslaughter after he
gave a statement saying he did the stabbing, Gallup Police Lt. Robert
Silva said this morning.
According to police reports, Toni and his brother Brian
Toni went to a house in the 600 block of South Fifth after their sister
Tasha Toni told them she had been kicked out of a party there...
Memorial service to honor Dukepoo
Stan Bindell
Special to the Independent
FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. — A memorial service for Frank Dukepoo, the
creator of the National Native American Honor Society and a specialist
in genetics, will be held at Northern Arizona University on Tuesday.
The service will start with a tree-planting ceremony at the corner
of Beaver and Dupont at 2:30 p.m. The memorial service will follow
from 3 to 4:30 p.m. at the University Union. A reception for the family
will be held 4:30-5 p.m. Those attending are asked to telephone (520)
523-2408.
Dukepoo died at his home in Flagstaff Oct. 27.
Dukepoo, 56, was the first Hopi to earn a doctorate and one of only
six Native Americans nationally who hold doctorates in the sciences.
He was the only Native American geneticist...
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City Council deeds land for park
Tom Purdom
Staff Writer
GRANTS — The city council has approved a resolution
deeding or transferring some of its land adjacent to the sewer plant
and golf course for the lower portion of Enchanted Skies Park.
The park is a joint educational venture being done by the United States
Air Force and the University of New Mexico. It is an astronomy park
that will have huge telescopes on top of a mesa.
At the base of the mesa will be a hands-on exhibit hall,
a restaurant and gift shop, and a tram house from which passengers
will board a tram for a ride to the top of the mesa and the observatory.
The university selected six possible sites, two of which are in Grants,
and one in Bibo on the eastern side of Cibola County. University officials
said the project is expected to draw about 250,000 visitors a year,
however, the project is far behind schedule...
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Workers hailed for bravery
Bill Donovan
Diné Bureau
GALLUP — Four employees at Rough Rock Community
School who risked their lives to try to save a school clerk who was
being stabbed to death by her husband have been cited for bravery
by the Navajo police.
The four Harry Claw, Ray K. Yazzie, Chaveson Dean and Tullie Bia kicked
in a locked door where the murder was taking place to confront Allison
Yazzie, 33, who had just killed his wife, Emma.
"It's something I will never forget," said
Claw, who has been a residential manager and counselor at the school
for the past three years. "I have never seen an individual killed
in front of my eyes and me being helpless to do anything about it."
Emma Yazzie had been Claw's secretary for two years before being transferred
a year ago to a secretary position in the records office, which she
held at the time of her death...
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