Time to free US political prisoner Leonard Peltier after 47 years in US jail

Leonard Peltier is a Native American activist who has been imprisoned for more than 47 years for the murders of two FBI agents he has always maintained his innocence. He has suffered for nearly half a century in US prisons for a crime he did not commit.

In a recent interview with the Guardian to mark the start of his 48th year in prison, Peltier, aged 78, made a plea for clemency so that he can wander freely and hug his grandchildren for the first time.

He spoke about the pain of being deprived of his liberty, and his desire to be reunited with his homeland and community before he dies.

“Being free to me means being able to breathe freely away from the many dangers I live under in maximum custody prison. Being free would mean I could walk over a mile straight. It would mean being able to hug my grandchildren and great-grandchildren,” said Peltier.

“I have been kept away from my family and only seen them a few times over the past 47 years. It is more than hard, especially when the kids write to me and tell me they want to see me and I cannot afford the cost of travel. If I was free I would build me a home on my tribal land, help build the economy of our nations and give a home to our homeless children,” Peltier said in an interview conducted over email via one of his approved contacts.

Peltier was a leading member of the American Indian Movement (AIM), an organization established in 1968 to defend the rights of Native Americans. The FBI’s COINTELPRO (counter-intelligence program) immediately targeted AIM.

On June 26, 1975, dozens of FBI agents, US Marshals, and vigilantes descended on Oglala on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. A shootout occurred, during which the two FBI agents were killed. One Indian was also killed, but his death was never investigated.

At the same time, a deal was being signed giving the US government possession of Indian lands where uranium had been discovered. Many believe the FBI assault was meant to divert attention from this deal.

Peltier was in Oglala on June 26, 1975, but there is no evidence linking him to the killings.

The AIM members involved in the shootout scattered across the country, and Peltier later fled to Canada.

Peltier (pictured above) was arrested in Canada on February 6, 1976, and after a lengthy legal process in which US officials presented false documents, Peltier was extradited to the United States. Canadian officials later complained about the deception in the extradition procedure.  

His trial in the US was clearly unfair, as documented by the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee (LPDC), and he was found guilty and given two consecutive life sentences.  

Peltier, who is currently detained in Coleman, Florida, has spent 46 of the past 47 years in maximum security. Numerous recommendations to lower his prisoner classification have been rejected.

Life inside for Peltier has got even harder and lonelier since the start of the COVID pandemic. Human rights activists have called for his release, pointing out his failing health, including a bout of COVID-19.

“This place is becoming a complete lockdown institution. I’m living in a 6x12 cell built for one person that I am forced to share, where we spend 24 hours a day during these frequent lockdowns. You’re on guard every moment of the day … I am not receiving the medical treatment that I need and I suffer a lot of pain from the illness that needs treatment. A lot of programs are being taken away, and other privileges which make it even more stressful,” said Peltier.

UN experts last year called for Peltier’s immediate release after concluding that his protracted imprisonment amounted to arbitrary detention.

“Mr. Peltier’s detention has been prolonged by parole officials who have departed from guidelines and failed to follow regulations pertaining to his parole proceedings. This, in addition to the influence of the FBI over the case, is the reason why he remains in detention during the Covid-19 pandemic, which is a threat to his life,” they said.

A former FBI agent close to the case, Coleen Rowley, last month accused the agency of harboring a vendetta against Peltier and called for his release. Rowley called for a presidential pardon.

Rowley, the former legal counsel at the Minneapolis FBI office, told the British newspaper that in the 1990s she helped ghostwrite an op-ed arguing against Peltier’s release.

Peltier said: “I’m very disappointed that she was involved in creating false evidence and took this long for her to come forward. However, I am grateful now that she did decide to tell the truth … I am hopeful that Biden will sign my clemency. But I am not sure there will be any difference."

Peltier slammed the US justice system and called it “racist” but still hoped the Biden administration will grant him clemency despite the FBI’s 47-year effort to block his freedom.

“Of course, I know from my own experiences that the justice system sucks in America, and for us natives has not changed much in that area. It’s 2023 but it’s still a very racist system,” he said.

The family has said Peltier is struggling with diabetes, hypertension, partial blindness from a stroke and an abdominal aortic aneurysm and that he tested positive for COVID in late January at the Federal Correctional Complex Coleman’s high-security facility.

“Leonard Peltier is a political prisoner of the United States. He was representing the American Indian Movement which had been invited to assist the local people at the Pine Ridge Reservation during the mid-1970s,” said Abayomi Azikiwe, an African American journalist in Detroit.

“After a series of confrontations with the federal government he fled to Canada. Peltier was charged with the murder of two FBI agents who had attacked the reservation. Peltier as indigenous person was not eligible for deportation from Canada to the US where he was not able to get a fair trial,” he told Press TV.

“Even today, after 47 years, he remains incarcerated in federal prison. Peltier should be granted clemency for release so he can rejoin his people, family and the struggle for Native American rights. Moreover, he has medical ailments which require specialized treatment. Therefore, he should be released immediately by the Biden administration,” added Azikiwe.

Criminal justice reform advocates have continued to highlight his arrest and conviction over decades, saying it symbolizes systemic problems with how Native Americans are treated in the white man’s so-called justice system, where an Indian had to be punished for the deaths of the two agents of the empire, and it didn’t really matter if he was guilty or not.

Human rights organizations and prominent political and religious figures, including Pope Francis and the Dalai Lama and other Nobel Peace Prize recipients, such as Nelson Mandela and Bishop Desmond Tutu, are reported to have called for Peltier's release.

Peltier: US continues to wage war against Native Americans

In an article entitled “Struggling for justice: A message from Leonard Peltier” published on January 12, 2007, on the Party for Socialism and Liberation site, Peltier wrote that the US has waged, and continues to wage, war not just against Native Americans but against any form of domestic political dissent.

“The United States government keeps me imprisoned to justify the continuing abuses against not only Native American people but anyone who seeks to fight criminal abuses such as those committed and/or aided by the FBI on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation between 1973 and 1976," he wrote. 

"This country has waged, and continues to wage, war not just against Native Americans but against any form of domestic political dissent. Secret domestic intelligence programs, such as the well-documented COINTELPRO program and the Patriot Act, have eroded and destroyed the constitutional rights and liberties of all peoples of this nation. But most people would rather ignore injustice than take a stand against injustice and face the wrath of our government,” he added. 

“I was a member of the American Indian Movement who, like many others, was subjected to a number of Counterintelligence (COINTELPRO) type activities by the FBI. ‘COINTELPRO’ is the FBI acronym for a series of covert action programs directed against domestic political groups. This program was investigated and condemned by a Congressional hearing in the 1970s. With this unauthorized program, the FBI engaged in covert actions designed to ‘disrupt’ and ‘neutralize’ target groups and individuals engaged in political dissent. One of the COINTELPRO-type tactics used by the FBI, and in particular against AIM, was the infiltration of the legal defense by paid informants, violating attorney-client privilege. We have recently discovered evidence that the FBI did this in my case,” he wrote. 

“Indeed, a document recently produced by the FBI and recently introduced by my lawyers to a magistrate judge established that the FBI intentionally took actions to try to avoid producing documents in discovery in my case. But again, this seems to have had no impact on the court. The United States Federal Courts have recognized overwhelming evidence of FBI misconduct in my case which has already been revealed, yet it has continued to allow the FBI to use exemptions under FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) to shield its illegal tactics in this case, depriving me of my right to a fair trial.”

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