LJWorld.com / For Peltier supporters, Clinton's last day a 'day of shame'

Archive for Sunday, January 21, 2001

By Kevin Bates

January 21, 2001

Supporters of Leonard Peltier, a former American Indian Movement member convicted of killing two FBI agents in 1975, were "shocked and saddened" Saturday that clemency was denied by President Clinton.

Clinton, in one of his final executive acts, denied commuting Peltier's prison term two life sentences for the execution-style murders of two FBI agents during a siege at the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota.

Peltier, 56, has spent the last 25 years in federal prison. Advocates for Peltier's release from the U.S. Penitentiary at Leavenworth claim the U.S. government falsified evidence leading to Peltier's arrest and coerced false testimony or hid exonerating evidence to obtain his conviction.

In a statement on its Web site, the Lawrence-based Leonard Peltier Defense Committee said it was "both shocked and saddened by President Clinton's decision. The history of our government's dealings with the first citizens of this country have been tragic at best, and oftentimes shameful. Today will be remembered as but another day of U.S. government shame and betrayal of Native people."

However, Gary Hawke of Lawrence, a friend of slain FBI agent Jack Coler, said the decision was a just one.

"I don't relish anybody being in jail for life, but if anybody deserves it, Leonard Peltier does. These were executions. I think a lot of his (Coler's) wife and children and how they suffer."