Portside

Leonard Peltier, the 79-year-old Indigenous activist who has spent nearly 50 years in prison for the 1975 murders of two FBI agents, has been denied parole. Many fear the ruling all but ensures that the longest-imprisoned Indigenous American will die behind bars.

Peltier has maintained his innocence since he was arrested in connection with the deaths that occurred at the Pine Ridge Indian reservation in South Dakota. For decades, advocates such as Coretta Scott King, Nelson Mandela, Pope Francis and James H Reynolds, the US attorney who handled the prosecution and appeal of Peltier’s case, have fought for his release.

Despite evidence of prosecutorial misconduct and due process violations throughout his trial, Peltier will now remain in prison at least until 2026, when the US Parole Commission set his next hearing. His health has severely declined over the past few years, and his supporters considered his most recent hearing, which occurred last month, his last chance of not dying in prison.

On 26 June 1975, years-long tensions between Oglala Lakota traditionalists, who sought to govern in customary ways, and assimilationists, who wanted to adapt to American standards of governance, culminated in a standoff at the Pine Ridge Indian reservation. Two FBI agents in unmarked cars pursued a vehicle they believed to be operated by Jimmy Eagle, for whom they were serving an arrest warrant, onto a part of the reservation that was occupied by traditionalists.

In the chaos, a shootout erupted and the FBI agents were soon joined by more than 150 Swat team members and other law enforcement. By the end, two FBI agents and a member of the American Indian movement (Aim) – a cold war-era liberation group that supported the traditionalists – had been killed.

Peltier was among the four men who were indicted in connection with the agents’ murders.

Since then, the FBI has been the staunchest opponent of Peltier, his claims of innocence and his supporters’ calls for his freedom. Mike Clark, president of the Society of Former Special Agents of the FBI, called Peltier a “cold-blooded murderer”. When Bill Clinton had the opportunity to pardon Peltier as he was leaving office, hundreds of federal agents marched to the White House in what CBS news called an “unprecedented protest”.

But former FBI agent Colleen Rowley has said that the federal agency has a “vendetta” against Peltier.

In a 2023 letter to Joe Biden, she wrote: “Retribution seems to have emerged as the primary if not sole reason for continuing what looks from the outside to have become an emotion-driven ‘FBI Family’ vendetta.”

Tensions between assimilationists and traditionalists

Forty-nine years ago, Peltier, a citizen of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians, became an activist in Aim, which sought to force the American government to recognize Indigenous sovereignty, to preserve Indigenous culture and traditions and to eradicate the discrimination Indigenous people faced, along with other goals. Early in its history, Aim had occupied Alcatraz, a former prison in San Francisco Bay; taken over a replica of the Mayflower II ship; marched on Washington DC in what was called the “trail of broken treaties”; and occupied the Bureau of Indian Affairs headquarters.

In the 1970s, tensions between then tribal chair Richard “Dick” Wilson, who was pro-assimilation, and traditionalists began to mount at Pine Ridge. Oglala Lakota traditionalists alleged that Wilson showed preferential treatment, including access to jobs and assistance, to other pro-assimilationists. As Aim sought to unite Indigenous nations and people, they allied with the traditionalists. Wilson allied with the FBI.

In 1973, traditionalists and Aim occupied the Pine Ridge hamlet of Wounded Knee to protest the abuses they were suffering. Though it was winter, the Department of Justice cut off electricity, water and food supplies to Wounded Knee and sent hundreds of FBI agents, federal marshals, police and military personnel to suppress the siege. Press were barred, too, but Kevin Barry McKiernan, a 30-year-old journalist, was smuggled in. For the Minnesota Leader, McKiernan detailed the scramble for food and the prevalence of gunfire and chaos on the reservation.

The occupation lasted 71 days, with 14 Wounded Knee occupants injured, and three killed, including Ray Robinson, a Black civil-rights activist from Alabama.

After the 1973 military action at Wounded Knee, Wilson outlawed Aim and barred traditionalists from meeting and attending traditional ceremonies, but the unrest continued. Peltier was among the dozen Aim activists who returned to the reservation to assist traditionalists, setting up camp at Jumping Bull ranch at Pine Ridge, the site of the 1975 melee.

‘It occurred to me that another injustice had occurred’

Peltier’s trial was rife with inconsistencies and errors.

The all-white jury did not hear about the underlying tensions between the two factions at Pine Ridge reservation, context that could have helped them understand why Peltier and other Aim members were there in the first place. A juror admitted that she was “prejudiced against Indians” but was still allowed to remain on the case. Witnesses claimed that FBI agents had threatened and coerced them into their testimonies. And the prosecution withheld ballistics evidence, including the fact that Peltier’s rifle could not be matched to shell casings in the trunk of the FBI agents’ car.

Peltier was found guilty of the murders and given two consecutive life sentences. One of his current attorneys, Kevin Sharp, said he had been moved to take on Peltier’s case after a supporter sent Sharp a file including trial transcripts, court opinions, Freedom of Information Act documents from the FBI and newspaper articles.

“It occurred to me that another injustice had occurred,” Sharp, a former federal judge, said. “The misconduct in the investigation, the prosecutorial misconduct, disturbed me. And so I contacted that person and said: ‘Look, if Mr Peltier wants me to represent him, I will do it pro bono.”

Since joining the case, Sharp says he has been frustrated with “the system that refuses to acknowledge the government’s role in what happened in June of 1975, refuses to acknowledge the context of what happened, refuses to acknowledge the violation of rights that happened”.

‘The prosecution and incarceration of Mr Peltier is unjust’

Earlier this year, Brian Schatz, the US senator from Hawaii and chairperson of the Senate committee on Indian affairs, led a group of senators including Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Mazie Hirono and others, in urging the US attorney general, Merrick Garland, to allow for Peltier’s compassionate release. The seven senators wrote a letter to Garland in March.

“Mr Peltier, who has been imprisoned for the past 49 years and is suffering from severe health conditions, should be able to return home and live out his remaining days among his own people,” the letter reads.“It is time that the federal government rectifies the grave injustice of Mr Peltier’s continued imprisonment, and strongly urge you to allow for his compassionate release.”

Reynolds called Peltier’s conviction and continued incarceration “a testament to a time and a system of justice that no longer has a place in our society”.

“With time, and the benefit of hindsight, I have realized that the prosecution and continued incarceration of Mr Peltier was and is unjust,” Reynolds wrote in a July 2021 letter to the president. “We were not able to prove that Mr Peltier personally committed any offense on the Pine Ridge Reservation.”

On Peltier’s 79th birthday last year, hundreds of supporters rallied outside the White House urging Biden to grant clemency. Through a statement in which he also thanked his supporters, Peltier himself was able to speak.

“I hope to breathe free air before I die. Hope is a hard thing to hold, but no one is strong enough to take it from me,” Peltier wrote. “There is a lot of work left to do. I would like to get out and join you in doing it.

Neither Peltier nor his supporters are confident he will live to see his 2026 parole date.

Adria R Walker is a reporter on the Guardian US's race and equity team. Her reporting focuses on the Deep South