FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
1/19/2010
U.S. GOVERNMENT CONTINUES HOLOCAUST AGAINST TERMINATED
UINTA UTES. FELTER V. SALAZAR DISMISSED ON JANUARY 15, 2010
Order to Dismiss and Judges Memorandum Opinion
TO: FELTER V. SALAZAR PLAINTIFFS
FROM: Attorney for the Individual Felter V. Salazar Plaintiffs:
Dennis G. Chappabitty of Chiricahua Apache and
Comanche Descent, from Sacramento, California.
Dennis is a Federal Indian Attorney.
916-682-0575 or chaplaw@earthlink.net
As part of a “Journey to Justice” a Lawsuit was filed against the U.S. Department of the Interior in the U.S. District Court, District of Columbia on November 4, 2002. The Plaintiffs in this federal civil action include both Original terminated Mixed Bloods, members of the Uinta Band of Ute Indians of Utah and their descendants. They are seeking the return of their original status as federally-recognized Indian before the enactment of the “Ute Partition and Termination Act” (UPA) 1954. The key to their argument was the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) had incorrectly implemented the UPA and thus the court must declare the racially based law as “null and void.” There should have also been an Accounting, which they never received to this day even though it was brought before Congress thirty-four years ago, by the American Indian Policy Review Commission, Congress of the United States. The Task force was sent here to investigate the termination of the mixed blood Uintahs of the Ute Indian tribe in 1975. In October of 1976 the Task Force gave their final report to Congress with the following recommendations:
(Quote) However the Task Force is quite aware of the high stakes involved, “A tribe ravaged and divided by termination, a “recognized Ute Tribe” subjugated to an impending “termination” and to further aggravate matters, a reservation “Rich in vital “Natural Resources such as “Natural Gas, Minerals and Water.” The Task Force recommends further and “Immediate investigation into the situation on the Uintah-Ouray Reservation, “Involving Bureau of Indian Affairs mismanagement of the Trust Funds and Non Ethical and “Illegal Bureau of Indian Affairs Administrative actions, throughout each phase of the termination.” Page: 1702 F. “Congress should direct the “General Accounting” office to immediately proceed with a “full and complete investigation of “trust mismanagement of “Assets” of all terminated Tribes in particular the Klamath Tribe of Oregon and the “Terminated Ute Indians of Utah.. (unquote)
On January 27, 2006, Judge Roberts dismissed Felter find that the case was not filed within the applicable six-year period found in 28 U.S.C. 2401 (a). The UPA is the only remaining law on the books legalizing an inherently “genocidal Act of the U.S. Congress, and this needs to be changed immediately! (Memo from Judge Roberts)
The most glaring example of the utter failure of the UPA is “Ute Distribution Corporation” (UDC) an entity that as Justice Douglas of the United States Supreme Court in Affiliated Ute Citizens of the State of Utah et al. v. United States et al Mr. Justice Douglas concurring in part and dissenting in part: “The Ute Distribution Corporation was not chartered according to the guidelines mandated by Congress. Rather than following the requirements for a majority vote of the “mixed blood members, it was “created” by the five board members of Affiliated Ute Citizens. Approval of its articles of incorporation was by a vote of only 42-5 far short of the majority of the 490 mixed -blood Ute's
Required by 25 U.S.C. 677e. After incorporation, 10 shares of stock were issued to each of the mixed blood Ute s. Despite the “Flaws” in Ute Distribution Corporation's formation, the Bureau of Indian Affairs treated it and not Affiliated Ute Citizens as the “authorized representatives.” Payments for mineral rights were thus made to Ute Distribution, which in turn passed them on to its “shareholders” as dividends.
Because the Bureau of Indian Affairs viewed the transfer of mineral interests to Ute Distribution as one to the authorized representative, cf 25 U.S.C. 677o(a), the restrictions on the transfer of individual property were removed and the federal trust relationship purportedly was terminated. 25 U.S.C. 677V;26 Fed. Reg. 8042. It was upon this basis that the courts below held that the individual mixed blood Ute's and the Affiliated Ute's no longer had cognizable interests in the “mineral estate of the reservation.”
Even if the Federal trust relationship was terminated to individual property interests, it does not follow that the “trust relationship was also terminated as to the group interest in the mineral rights.” The United States continued to owe significant obligations and duties with regard to these mineral interests.
Ute Distribution Corporation consist of largely non-Indians, large corporations, and the Ute Indian Tribe, whom Congress never intended for Non Indians, Corporations or the Ute Indian Tribe to receive the funds generated off the Ute Distribution Corporation Stock Shares that were meant only for the Original 490 and their heirs. When Ute Distribution Corporation files cases in court they continually use the term “Mixed-Bloods” as the individuals they represent such as in the case “UDC v. Secretary of the Interior, in the Water Case. Just for example in their transcript it states:
“Mr. Smith (atty) is talking to the Court and states: “My second point is if the U.D.C. Has a 27% share, Mr. Wheeler (UDC attorney) is “incorrect in saying “All Mixed Bloods” will share in that. The only people that will share in whatever the benefits are in that are the “Shareholders in the Ute Distribution Corporation, which the vast majority of whom are “Not Mixed Bloods.”
This needs to stop! The only mixed bloods that Ute Distribution Corporation represents is the Original terminated 490 who still own their UDC stock shares, which is very few. UDC according to their own Constitution and by laws “Cannot represent any of the Original Terminated Mixed Bloods who does not own UDC stocks, but yet time after time they file cases in the courts using the term “mixed-blood” when if they were to win anything it would be for the “Ute Distribution Corporation Stockholders.” If they want to file in the courts they need to use the name on behalf of the Ute Distribution Corporation Stockholders.” We will be watching this very closely. We will also be publishing a list of the Ute Distribution stockholders Names and Addresses to pass out to the Senators, Congressmen, Public, Indian Tribes and others so everyone can see who the “Ute Distribution Corporation really is.”
Dennis G. Chappabitty, Esq., Counsel of record of Felter v. Salazar appealed the case on to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. Mr. Chappabitty flew back to Washington D.C. for oral arguments before Circuit Judges Tatel, Kavanaugh and Senior Judge Williams, on December 11, 2006. Mr. Chappabitty’s argument on appeal was that Public Law 108-108 enacted by Congress on November 10, 2003 as a consequence of the Cobell Trust accounting litigation must apply to Felter and its cause of action for an accounting to require remand to the lower court and further discovery. “No Accounting has been made to Appellants of their pre-existing non UPA property and the money that was maintained and managed by the BIA.” P.L. 108-108 has provisions within it exempting any claim from the statue of limitations, including any claim in litigation pending on the date of the enchantment of this Act, concerning the losses to or mismanagement of trust funds, until the affected tribe or individual Indian has been furnished with an accounting of such funds from which the beneficiary can determine whether there has been a loss.”
In 2007 the U.S. Court of Appeals “reversed” Judge Roberts ruling and directed him to consider whether the terminated Ute's had access to their financial records and received an accounting of what had transpired.
The Ute Partition Act was enacted by Congress to terminate the entire Ute Indian Tribe and not only the mixed bloods. “If ever there was a law based on race remaining on the books that allowed me and hundreds of other innocent Indians to continue to be victimized by a Federal Policy that has been rejected long, long ago, the Ute Partition Act is it.” “Our position is that either the UPA be repealed for all times or it must be applied to the renaming bands of the Ute Indian Tribe and they must be terminated to complete P.L. 671.”
This Federal Lawsuit came about because the members of the United States Congress and Bureau of Indian Affairs officials have “failed to do their job and repeal the Ute Partition Act against her and her terminated people”. Oranna states: “Their failure goes against everything America stands for. Our State and Federal Representatives should be standing beside us, this is not the image of America that I want the world to see and know us by, that our Federal Government, Bureau of Indian Affairs and State and Federal Representatives have done a great injustice towards the terminated mixed bloods and their family members. Our members have served in the U.S. Armed Forces risking their lives, for people of other countries, so they could have their freedoms and rights as human beings, and all the while their own federal government was stripping them of their tribal citizenship rights with the stroke of a pen. We are the only remaining law on the books “legalizing” an inherently “genocidal” Act of the United States Congress, against me and my people, after fifty six plus years of being “Prisoners of Termination” its time to give us back our identities of who we really are and who we have always been, American Indians.”
On Friday January 15, 2010 Mr. Chappabitty received the word from Judge Roberts that the Felter case had been dismissed because although P.L. 108-108 did revive at the time of its enactment time-barred claims then pending in litigation, it did not waive the preclusive effects of prior judgments, and the plaintiffs are collaterally estoppel from arguing that the defendants had an obligation to supervise in trust the plaintiffs share of the ICC judgment. Chappabitty believes that there are good faith grounds to file yet another appeal: “I am confident that we can successfully frame several legitimate arguments that will raise the central issue on appeal that no previous cases ever precisely addressed what we alleged in Felter.”
We feel like prisoners just being released from Judge Roberts Court after being held waiting on a decision for “Seven plus Years.” Now we are “Free” to go on to the United States Court of Appeals and receive the Justice that we are asking for. As we await the Courts decision there we will be working on the repeal of the UPA, and will expose information of people who took our lives away fifty five plus years ago, we will continue our “Journey to Justice.”
As Individual Named Plaintiffs in Felter I expect you to stand tall, to continue your support of this very important case. To the ones who have been dragging along its time you fall in. The time that Judge Roberts has taken away from us, the loved ones we have lost who were waiting has been hard on all of us, but now the gates are open for us to “run through” and let the world know what happened to the terminated mixed bloods and their descendants, and hopefully through the United States Court of Appeals in the District of Columbia we will get the justice we should have been given when we started this case almost eight years ago.
It is time for all of you to come together with the spirit that our loved one had who had so much faith and confidence in this case such as, “Edith D. Gardner” “Big Sonny Denver” “Ellis Denver” “Selma Christensen” “Elmer Hackford” “LeRoy Christensen” “Naturitch K. Nielson” “Lura Reed” “Martin Reed” “Phyliss Oberhansly” just to name a few of our elders who have journeyed on waiting for this case but knowing it would make a difference.
We Walk, We Fight, We Crawl if we have to let them know we will not forget!!
Just as the Cobell Plaintiffs fought for “thirteen almost fourteen years” they hung together and appealed time after time against the government, now they are rejoicing their victory, and they made a difference for every Indian Tribe. We can do the same!!
I ask you to “Keep the Fires Burning for you, your loved ones who journeyed on, and for your Ancestors who is counting on you to make a difference by smashing the Law that destroyed their lives. Until this is done they cannot and will not rest in peace.
The January 31st 2010 is approaching fast that I mentioned in my December 27, 2009 interim report to you. Because of the Decision that was just handed down I will extend the date to: February 15, 2010, for you to bring your accounts up to currant status by paying in full if possible. These contributions are important to keep our case alive. Now, I will be spending hours of research, going through documents, printing and preparing the brief to be filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals, this will also mean that I will need to be paid for my time, and filing fees.
Should you choose not to help by not making the requested contributions when asked for, your name will be taken off the case. (refer to your letter dated December 27, 2009 interim report to plaintiffs). Send your contributions in as soon as you receive this letter to: Oranna B. Felter, Felter v. Salazar, P.O. Box 465, Fort Duchesne, Utah 84026.
If you are sending by check or money order please keep your return checks or M.O stubs, as we will not be sending any more receipts back, your money order or check stub will serve as your receipt, but you will be credited. We cannot afford the extra expense of postage, which also reminds me that we got a massive amount of “returned mail” back the last mailing, once we receive them we will no longer send out a second letter, we cannot afford it, so make sure your addresses is up to date.
I would have liked to come up when this decision came down last Friday, to meet with you in person, but it was feasible to do so at this time, so please consider this letter as your official notice of the dismissal from Judge Roberts Court and also your Second Notice on your Accounts.
There will be an “Official Press Release, later on when the brief is completed and is filed in Washington D.C.” Your will be informed.
Dennis G. Chappabitty
Counsel of Record in Felter v. Salazar