FORT DUCHESNE, Uintah County — The leadership of the Northern Ute Indian Tribe has gone on the offensive in what appears to be the resurrection of a dispute over who has the right to enforce the law if a tribal member commits a crime in certain areas of the Uinta Basin.
The tribe's Business Committee has voted to reject any effort by state officials in Utah to assume civil or criminal jurisdiction over tribal members within the exterior boundaries of the Uintah and Ouray Reservation, according to a resolution made public Thursday.
The resolution comes in response to legal changes that would allow the state to assume jurisdiction on the reservation with the consent of the tribe and the federal government. The Tribal Law and Order Act of 2010, signed by President Barack Obama in July, amended the Indian Civil Rights Act of 1968 to allow concurrent tribal and state jurisdiction in Indian Country under limited circumstances.
"Through confusion resulting from various court rulings, such as Hagen (v. Utah), the state of Utah has attempted to assume civil and criminal jurisdiction over certain 'checkerboard' areas of the tribe's reservation," said Business Committee Chairman Richard Jenks Jr. in a statement publicizing the tribe's resolution.
"The Ute Indian Tribe seeks to work with the federal government to clarify and increase (the tribe's) role in assuming tribal jurisdiction over these areas."
In Hagen v. Utah, a 1989 case from the Uinta Basin that went all the way to the nation's highest court, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a ruling that the Uintah and Ouray Reservation was diminished when Congress opened it up to non-Indian settlers in the early 1900s.
Shortly after the Hagen ruling, there was an agreement among the Ute Tribe, the state of Utah and officials in Duchesne and Uintah counties. That agreement, according to Duchesne County Sheriff Travis Mitchell, allowed tribal members arrested on lands that were once part of the reservation to request that their cases be heard in tribal court.
In exchange for allowing this to happen, the tribe pledged to modify its Law and Order Code to more closely resemble Utah's Criminal Code and bring its court system up to accepted judicial standards, the sheriff said.
The agreement expired in November 2008, and Duchesne County has not renewed it. Mitchell said he's heard rumblings since then about the tribe wanting to assert jurisdiction over members who are detained or arrested within the exterior boundaries of the reservation, but he believes the Hagen ruling settled the issue.
"We got to where we are based on rulings from the Hagen case, and as far as we're concerned, that's the law," he said. "I don't think the tribal Business Committee has got the right to countermand a court decision.
"All I think they're going to do is stir it up, and we're going to go back into litigation some way or another," the sheriff added. "Just because they put that (resolution) out doesn't change anything for me. The county attorney is our legal adviser, and he'll determine what the correct course of action is."
Duchesne County Attorney Stephen Foote could not be reached for comment, and Scott Troxel, spokesman for Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff, said the state would not be weighing in on the tribe's resolution at this time.
Tribal leaders had scheduled two meetings last month with representatives from the U.S. Attorney's Office for Utah to discuss their concerns over the changes in federal law, however, those meetings never took place, said Ute Business Committee member Stewart Pike.
"The word came down from them that they wanted to meet with us concerning deputizing certain officers to come onto the reservation," Pike said. "As far as we were concerned, we didn't want any intrusion from any outside entities, such as the state, on the reservation."
Pike said it's his opinion that state and local officials interpreted the Hagen ruling "the way they wanted to" and used it to assume control over tribal members in civil and criminal matters.
"The tribe never did undertake what it gained in the Hagen ruling," Pike said. "The state assumed they were the only one to gain something of an advancement in jurisdiction. They exercised that right after the case, and we didn't. I guess we're coming in now to exercise what we won under the Hagen case."
When asked what the tribe "won" in Hagen, Pike responded: "The same thing as what the state is assuming."
"They're asserting their jurisdiction over what they call the 'checkerboarded' reservation," he continued. "Everything you can think of, they assume jurisdiction of through state, county or city ordinances. We're going to do the same thing. If it's tribal land, we're going to assert our jurisdiction."
Pike said the counties were granted permission in the past to put roads across tribal land to access private property or recreation areas like Moon Lake. That access was based on the counties' promise to maintain the roads. It did not come with a right to enforce traffic or criminal codes on those roads, he said.
"They just sort of broadened it," Pike said. "Right now, it's affecting the tribe and its membership by the uncalled-for patrolling by county or state officers on these roads."
Melody Rydalch, spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office for Utah, said federal attorneys plan to meet with Ute leaders within the next few weeks to discuss the issues raised in the tribal resolution. She declined, however, to comment on what may have prompted tribal leaders to draft and pass the resolution.
"Discussions related to the new Tribal Law and Order Act are ongoing and certainly something we will be happy to discuss with tribal leaders," Rydalch said. "Our relationship with the tribe is a priority in this office."
e-mail: geoff@ubstandard.com
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