A federal judge Tuesday sentenced former Navajo Chairman Peter MacDonald to 14 years and 7 months in prison on convictions stemming from a 1989 fatal riot.
The prison term will run concurrently with shorter prison and jail terms that MacDonald is serving from other cases, U.S. District Judge Robert Broomfield ordered.MacDonald, 64, and nine co-defendants were convicted Nov. 13 on charges stemming from a July 20, 1989, riot at the tribe's headquarters in Window Rock. Two MacDonald supporters were killed and six other people, including three tribal police officers, were injured.
The riot occurred as MacDonald supporters and tribal police clashed outside the headquarters where the supporters had marched in what prosecutors alleged was a plot to enable MacDonald to resume power.
"The trial has been called a political trial," Broomfield said before he sentenced MacDonald. "It was not. It was about crime."
The judge said MacDonald, despite claims by he and his supporters that he urged his supporters to refrain from marching, was "the undisputed leader and organizer of the conspiracy." MacDonald was not present at the riot scene.