Leonard Peltier waited fifty years and did what he increasingly doubted whether he could do: personally against Native Americans and others who spent those years fighting for his own freedom Others expressed their gratitude.
Peltier, 80, repeatedly snatched his right fist and showed some blind people in need of a walker Amazing endurance. He was released a day ago from a federal prison in central Florida, where he was sentenced to life imprisonment for killing two federal agents.
Now he is back with his people, the Turtle Mountain band in Chippewa, North Dakota. In President Joseph R. Biden Jr.
“I am proud of the position I have taken – fighting for our right to survive,” Perthier said in his eight-minute speech. “I am proud of the support you have shown me, and it's hard for me to do so,” he said. Prevent myself from crying. ” “From the first hour of my arrest, Indians came to my rescue and they have been behind me ever since. It's worth my sacrifice for you.”
It was an extremely unlikely moment in July when Mr. Perthier was again denied parole during a 1975 gunfight on a South Dakota reservation.
For many law enforcement officers, Mr. Perthier is a ruthless killer whose appeal has been reviewed and rejected by more than 20 federal judges.
But support for human rights groups including Amnesty International and including the Dalai Lama, former South African president and anti-apartheid leader Nelson Mandela and musician Steven Van Zandt Mr. Pettier has been wrongly convicted of Célèbre as part of the history of Native American repression.
“Friends, relatives, strangers suffer for Leonard, pray for him, dance for him, fast and suffer for him, take care of him, long for him to walk the earth as a free man,” Pulitzer said. Award-winning novelist Louise Erdrich, who is also a member of the Turtle Mountain tribe, said in an email.
Ms. Erdrich attended Mr. Peltier's trial in 1977 and has long argued that he had unfairly paid the price for the violence of other Native American activists.
Ms. Edridge said: “Leonard has always been the great idea of us as a country. “We confuse greatness with economic power or military power, but nothing. Greatness is justice, greatness is tolerance. ”
Mr. Perthier is a member of the American Indian Movement or Targeted American Tribe, an advocacy organization founded in 1968.
In the 1970s, armed members of the group clashed with federal authorities on the Pineridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. They forcibly seized control of the injured knee village and kept the authorities for 71 days.
Two years after the injured knee standoff, Native American activists still wear off relations with federal law enforcement agencies, two FBI agents – Jack Coler and Ronald Williams attempted to arrest the robbery suspect on the Pine Tree Ridge reservation.
A gunfight followed, killing two agents and an activist. Mr. Peltier has admitted to shooting from a distance, but insists that he is self-defense and not the one who killed the agents. Of the more than 30 people present during the gunfight, Mr. Perthier was the only one to be convicted.
Mr. Pettier’s trial was excluded from evidence of the acquittal of two other targeted members accused of murder, a question often raised by his supporters as an example of injustice.
But in a letter in June 2024, when opposing Mr. Perthier's application for parole, then FBI Director Christopher A. killed people.
The order to release him back to North Dakota encountered strong opposition from many law enforcement officers.
“Peltier is back home – though Coler or William,” Michael J. Clark, former president of the FBI's Special Agents Society, said in an email Wednesday. Neither Williams got the same chance. “Perthier is a ruthless murderer who should be sentenced to life imprisonment in federal prison.”
Mr. Peltier brought it to Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation late Tuesday, as the sun was fading, the temperature was a dangerous cold minus 15 degrees – his temperature was 90 degrees swaying than the temperature in the recent federal correctional facility. , in Coleman, Florida.
Dozens of residents greeted him with the words “50 Years of Resistance” as he was driven to his new home in the town of Belcott. According to Nick Tilsen, the house was purchased by NDN Collective, an indigenous rights group based in Rapid City, South Carolina. Founder and CEO of the Group.
Bob Marley's “Song of Redemption” plays, banners and signatures fill Wednesday's homecoming lunch. Some were obviously used in previous protests – “Enough: Free Leonard Peltier”, but there are some new ones, including photos of Mr. Peltier, as well as his Prison Bureau number, 89637-132, crossed.
In his speech, Peltier talked about his concerns about local issues and described the harsh conditions in prison, including being placed in sensory deprivation cells at some point.
He said he had to deal with many restrictions even in the new situation of the House arrest. “But it's much better than being in a cell,” he added.
Then he held a courtroom for over an hour, like a signature hall of fame, with more than 100 people lined up to say hello, showed gifts, posed for photos or got some signatures.
Some supporters warn that he will encounter a different world—some things are better, and some things are worse than the world he experienced fifty years ago.
Jayme Davis, a Democrat in the region who is also a member of the Turtle Mountain tribe, noted that many people have lost their jobs and are full of anxiety about the future.
“Our people face great challenges, especially when our state governments move forward with policies that make survival more difficult,” Ms. Davis said. “But in this moment, I feel his homecoming will be It is a beacon of light. His reward has a great weight, almost as if there is a message in the timing.”
Mr. Tilson said Mr. Pertir expressed his desire to engage in juvenile suicide as he did some volunteer work on the Pine Ridge reservation. But he also said Peltier temporarily declined the interview request – Peltier needed some space.
“I think everyone is focused on him being this iconic international human rights activist and leader,” he said. “But he has also been institutionalized for 49 years. So he has to establish a new normal.”
Kirsten Noyes Contributed to the research.
