Native Lives Matter: A Solution to Police Violence in Indian Country

The perceived lack of justice in these

and many other cases sparked major demonstrations, including a Dec.

20 rally at the Mall of America that drew more than 3,000 protesters.

But as millions rallied around the

cause of human rights for African-Americans, many Indigenous people

wonder if America thinks their lives matter. For every Michael Brown,

for every Eric Garner, they say, there is a victim of police violence

in Indian Country whose name you probably don’t know.

“It’s

imperative to understand that this issue is not just about black

people and white people. Despite the available statistical evidence,

most people don’t know that Native Americans are most likely to be

killed by police, compared with other racial groups. Native Americans

make up about 0.8% of the population, yet account for 1.9% of police

killings,” Simon Moya-Smith, an Oglala Lakota journalist, wrote in

a CNN editorial last month.

“There is no outcry against what’s

happening in Native American communities,” Lemoine LaPointe, a

Lakota educator and community organizer from Rosebud, S.D. who lives

in the Twin Cities said. “These very same atrocities that have been

happening in the Black community have been happening to Native

American people and without protest. It has to stop.”

While police and military violence

against Native American people has been occurring for hundreds of

years, LaPointe said a recent rash of incidents could have been

avoided if police officers had been trained to use violence as a last

resort. He refers to the following as cases where lives might have

been saved had responding officers deployed nonlethal tactics.

Lakota Man killed by Rapid City,

S.D. Police after attending #NativeLivesMatter Rally

Dec. 19, 2014: Shouts of "Native

lives matter" and "Hands up don’t shoot" echoed along

two of Rapid City’s busiest streets as nearly 100 men, women and

children gathered to call attention to police brutality and the loss

of Native American lives in South Dakota’s second-largest city.

Among the marchers chanting and

praying for the Rapid Creek victims was Allen Locke, a 30 year-old

Lakota man, a sun dancer, and a resident of Rapid City who was about

to become the latest Native person killed by Rapid City Police.

"Discrimination is alive here,"

American Indian Movement leader Bill Means told the crowd before they

set out for a walk down Fifth Street and along Omaha Street. As

participants marched, the names of 25 individuals who have been

killed along Rapid Creek over the past two decades were read.

At the Sixth Street Bridge spanning

Rapid Creek the walkers paused to once again listen to the names of

those who died along the banks below. Many of the deaths that

occurred near Rapid Creek remain unsolved crimes, with cause of death

listed as blunt force trauma or suicide.

"It’s a human rights crisis that

we’re dying at those rates," said Chase Iron Eyes, Lakota

attorney and activist. "We’ve got problems, my relatives, but

we’re the only ones that can fix them. Only we can save us."

Royce Yellow Hawk of Rosebud, S.D.

sang a memorial song for those who died along the creek. His older

brother, Royal Yellow Hawk, was only 26 when his body was found near

the creek in 2001.

The Rapid Creek victims were

casualties of an "undeclared race war here in South Dakota,"

Iron Eyes said.

The day following the Rapid City

protest, police bullets took the life of Allen Locke. Locke was

killed by a white officer responding to a call of an “unwanted

subject” at 541 Paha Sapa Road. Just after 6 p.m. on Dec. 20,

Officer Anthony Meirose arrived on scene at the Lakota Homes housing

complex.

Capt. Dan Rud, a spokesman for the

Rapid City Police Department told reporters, “Officer Meirose

approached the house. While standing in the doorway, he was attacked

by a male subject with a knife. The officer drew his weapon and shot

the subject multiple times."

Emergency Medical Services were

immediately called to the scene but it was too late. Locke was

pronounced dead at Rapid City Regional Hospital.

Rud said Locke was shot up to five

times by Meirose, who was placed on paid administrative leave while

the killing is investigated.

The fatal shooting, coming just one

day after a non-violent protest against police brutality, ignited

suspicions of a racial motive. Rud sought to lay those suspicions to

rest. "This officer is white, the suspect is Native American,”

he said, “but it’s not a race deal. This is based on criminal

behavior and it had nothing to do with race. Had the race of the

Police Officer be Native American and the suspect white the results

would have been the same."

Locke’s family has not yet offered

its account of what occurred. His siblings, Christie and Darrell

Locke, released a statement asking for calm and patience as they said

goodbye.

“In light of the recent tragic

events that have transpired at Lakota Homes and that have claimed the

life of our son, brother, father, partner, grandson, uncle and loved

one, we feel it imperative to issue a public statement asking the

Rapid City and Native community at-large to bear with us as we grieve

our loss and make arrangements for Allen.

“We genuinely appreciate the prayer

vigils and ceremony circles that are being organized in Allen’s

memory; this is a crucial time for our family as Allen is making his

spirit journey.

“We feel the community’s hurt; we

know you are angry, we know you are sad and we know everyone is on

edge as a result of Allen’s violent death coming off the heels of

his participation in the Anti-Police Brutality Rally and March a day

before this horrific incident. There are many details that we will

share in time but we are trying very hard to hold it together and to

be strong and peaceful in order to send our loved one off.”

Mah-hi-vist “Red Bird”

Goodblanket Killed by Custer County Deputies

Eighteen year-old Mah-hi-vist

Goodblanket, Cheyenne-Arapaho from Custer County, Okla., was

diagnosed with Oppositional Defiant Disorder in 2009. On Dec. 13,

2013, according to reports published in The Oklahoman newspaper,

Mah-hi-vist was experiencing an episode associated with his medical

condition. His parents, Wilbur and Melissa Goodblanket called police

so that the teen wouldn’t harm himself. Two Custer County sheriff

deputies entered the Goodblanket home and moments later shot the

unarmed teen to death.

Goodblanket’s girlfriend, Naomi

Barron, who was present when he was killed, said in a statement that

Goodblanket had no weapons when the two white deputies opened fire.

"He [had] his arms up and his hands were free … he had no

weapons," she said.

The autopsy report

found that Goodblanket was shot seven times and determined the cause

of death to be homicide. According to family, he was a motivated

student who finished high school a year early and attended Haskell

Indian Nations University. The Goodblanket family awaits word on

whether or not the deputies will be charged.

Goodblanket’s mother told CNN she

can’t comprehend why mainstream media does not report on the killings

of unarmed Native Americans and why the killing of her son has failed

to spark a national response. "Our 18 year-old son was murdered.

This [incident] in itself should initiate an outrage among those who

value life."

The two white deputies involved in the

shooting both received the Medal of Honor and one received the Purple

Heart by his department after Goodblanket’s death. On the Custer

County Sheriff’s Facebook page, a post said the awards were in

"recognition of their performance above and beyond the call of

duty while disregarding their own personal safety and exhibiting

exceptional courage in a life threatening situation, stemming from a

domestic call they responded to in December of 2013 … "

John T. Williams Shot to Death by

Seattle Police

Williams, a 50-year-old traditional

wood carver of the Nuu-chah-nulth First Nation, was shot four times

by Seattle police officers on Aug. 30, 2010. The Seattle Times

reported that Williams died at the scene, which was capture by a

police dash cam. His only crime appears to have been walking down the

street carrying a small, legal carving knife and a chunk of cedar.

Officer Ian Birk fired his weapon five

times from a distance of 10 feet after giving Williams, who was deaf

in one ear, four seconds to drop the knife. Without explaining their

decision King County prosecutors decided not to charge Officer Birk

with a criminal offense.

Birk resigned after the Firearms

Review Board found that, among other problems, Birk didn’t identify

himself as a police officer as he approached Williams from behind.

The knife that Birk claimed was a threat was folded shut when found

by responding officers.

Eight Year-Old Lakota Girl Tased by

Police in Pierre, S.D.

On Oct. 4, 2013, the babysitter of an

8 year-old Lakota girl called police because the child had a knife in

her hand and was threatening to hurt herself. The police entered the

home and seconds later they Tased her from about five feet away. The

girl’s mother, Dawn Stenstrom, a member of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe,

said the police used “excessive force” when they used a Taser on

her girl.

A lawsuit filed against the City of

Pierre says, “The force of the electricity shot through her body,

lifted her, and threw her against the wall.”

Stenstrom’s attorney Dana Hanna told

the Rapid City Journal that the girl suffered physical,

psychological and emotional injuries. An investigation by the South

Dakota Division of Criminal Investigation ruled that the officers had

acted appropriately. Since the incident, Stenstrom and her daughter

have moved from Pierre back to the Rosebud Reservation.

Benjamin Whiteshield Shot in

Clinton, Okla. Police as Family Sought Care

On June 28, 2012, police officers in

the city of Clinton, Okla. shot and killed Cheyenne-Arapaho Nation

citizen Benjamin Whiteshield, 34, outside of their police station.

Whiteshield’s family took him to the police station to get him help

during a delusional episode. Whiteshield’s grandmother called

police in advance and reported that Benjamin was holding a wrench and

complaining that he didn’t know where he was. She is reported by

NewsOK as having been assured by officers they would not hurt her

grandson.

Several police officers met the family

outside the police station where one of them drew his weapon and shot

Whiteshield through the mouth. Family members say the several police

officers present should have been able to peaceably subdue him.

District Attorney Dennis Smith ruled

the shooting of Benjamin Whiteshield was justifiable. "We

believe the officer acted in self-defense," Smith told the

Clinton Daily News. "The officer has been cleared."

Crisis Intervention Team Training: A

Solution for Indian Country

“When you take a look at those

situations it appears like officers were at fault.” LaPointe said.

“But rather than just pointing fingers, what I’d really like to

do is offer a solution.”

That solution, LaPointe said, begins

with every police officer in Indian Country acquiring Crisis

Intervention Team training, a method of defusing interactions between

police and members of the public without the use of force.

“With that young girl that was Tased

in Pierre, for example: What happened to getting down on one knee and

being about the height of that young child and talking as one human

being to another?” LaPointe said. “That’s the best weapon that

police officers can carry is the ability to conduct dialogue with

someone. If we don’t enhance that ability to create rapport and

serve our citizenry then we’re in trouble. And people know it.”

CIT was developed in 1988 by the

University of Memphis in coordination with the Memphis Police

Department and mental health professionals. According to its

published guidelines, CIT provides law enforcement officials training

for assisting those individuals with a mental illness, improves the

safety of patrol officers, consumers, family members and citizens

within the community.

While the CIT protocols, also known as

the “Memphis Model” were designed for dealing with individuals

experiencing mental illness, they can be effective for the peaceful

diffusion of any crisis. LaPointe says there is urgency to act now to

implement CIT in Native communities.

“President Obama is asking for $260

million from congress to address issues of police violence around the

country. Native people have be part of the conversation or once again

we will not be heard,” LaPointe, who is a certified Crisis

Intervention Team (CIT) trainer, said.

“CIT is a movement based on the

notion of partnership between mental health providers, the police

department and community advocacy leaders,” Mark Anderson said. He

is the Executive Director of the Minneapolis-based Barbara Snyder

Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to the widespread adoption of the

Memphis Model. “It’s a tough coalition because they don’t

necessarily see eye to eye. Two of the partners are the system and

the third is trying to change the system. The idea is to create a

partnership between these three entities and then work on improving

the response to people in crisis.

“What we’re seeing in some of

these recent police killings is that there’s a big rush on the part

of the police officer to change something, which causes an escalation

of the confrontation and ends badly,” Anderson said. “The

questions CIT asks is what’s the rush? We teach the police to slow

down. Take the time to communicate. Remind them that this is a human

being you’re dealing with.”

LaPointe said he would like to see the

federal government grant the funds for regional conferences where

tribal government officials, BIA and tribal police officers, and

mental health professionals working in Indian communities come

together and “indigenize” CIT for widespread application in

Indian County.

“These situations haven’t been

addressed so the likelihood of them occurring again is certain,”

LaPointe warns. “We can save lives by being proactive.”

Dr. Dan Foster, Deputy

Director and Supervisory Clinical Psychologist Rosebud

(South Dakota) Indian Health Service Hospital and Clinic, said that

the Memphis Model could be particularly useful in Native

American communities. Foster attended a recent CIT training in

Rosebud and was impressed by its potential to save lives.

“It says in the preamble to the U.S.

Constitution that all are created equal. But, of course, we are not

all endowed with the same gifts. We all look a bit different from one

another and we all have different abilities. But what ‘All People are

Created Equal’ means to me is that the beauty of each person is not

in who they are, but what they do. CIT brings us back to the idea

that each individual person has great worth.”

While he admires the poetic wording of

America’s founding document, Foster indicts the “western system”

as a “system that doesn’t work well for our species.” He calls

homicide and suicide a “byproduct of the western system,” because

it “serves few well and makes the majority unhappy.”

Foster says he

would like to see CIT trainers on the Rosebud Reservation

semi-annually as an antidote to the violence. “This teaches us a

method for producing the very best outcomes for everyone involved,

the police, mental health professionals, and the community.”