What Really Happened at the Bank? - Who Do You Believe?

[@sueann9065]

The flag belongs to the tribe, not one family. Whomever the flag was given to received it and made decisions for the tribe, not just their household. Profits should be given to the tribe. If I'm a tribal leader and I am signing treaties and accepting flags, I am doing so on behalf of my tribe and not my household.

[@alicehudson332]

Thank you

[@MelindaGopherOmnimedia]

Actually that is incorrect. There is a federal law called the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, it is intended to protect items such as this from depredation, which this flag is currently in a desecrated state. The rule of thumb on NAGPRA is that a cultural item, in this case, must pass from one family member to the next, and such cultural items are by federal law, required to be returned to the family. There is a criminal provision to NAGPRA carrying a 100,000.00 fine and a 10 year prison sentence. Our family do not deem Mike to be proficient to carry the flag as he has a lifetime criminal career spanning his early teen years to 2018. It is our family decision as to who keeps and owns the flag. It will likely be kept jointly by my surviving siblings Blair who is in this episode, and my sister Mary. We lost three siblings during this fight that Mike started. I also want to point out, Mike subjected our late mother to extreme duress so she wouldn't create a private express family trust, which is what I supported, and he interfered with her making a will so she would die intestate.

[@sueann9065]

@@MelindaGopherOmnimedia I agree to disagree. The flag wasn't given to one family. It was given to a tribal leader on behalf of the tribe. The flag belongs to everyone in the tribe. Being a gatekeeper of a flag doesn't give you sole ownership. When your family member signed a treaty for peace, it was a treaty for peace with the entire tribe and not just your family. That flag is a symbol of the promise made to your tribe, not just your family alone.

[@MelindaGopherOmnimedia]

@@sueann9065 this is not how the federal NAGPRA law works, and it is very common practice for something to be passed down in family from one generation to the next, these are long established customs and norms, and it is not for outside court systems to interfere with these traditional tribal laws. Another traditional Ojibway tribal law is the forbidden use of Peyote, it is classified as a hallucinogenic. Marcus Red Thunder is a member of the Native American Church, the umbrella organization for peyote users and believers. Tribes have been held outside the boundaries of the US constitution where they are not bound to honor belief systems outside their tribal beliefs and customs. If you chose to disagree and continue please cite relevant laws rather than just an opinion. Also, Marcus family are from a Canadian first nation, called the Red Pheasant First Nation of CREE. Marcus as we can see, is not an Ojibway tribal member at all. Second, given he has engaged in substantial defrauding of the Ojibway tribe, he can in fact be banned from our tribe for life under what is termed the "Montana exceptions" that are outlined here: Montana v. United States, 450 U.S. 544 (1981) the Court held that Tribes could not exercise regulatory authority over nonmembers on fee-simple land within the reservation unless (1) the nonmember entered a "consensual relationship" with the Tribe or its members[ or (2) the nonmember's "conduct threatens or has some direct effect on the political integrity, the economic security, or the health or welfare of the tribe."

[@sueann9065]

@@MelindaGopherOmnimedia I agree to disagree. Your family chose to claim something that belonged to your tribe/ your nation and your family turned it into a family heirloom. The flag belongs to everyone in your tribe and not your family alone. If a leader outside of your family accepted that flag and then generations later that person's family claimed ownership of the flag as a family heirloom, you and your family would see the flag as the tribe's flag.

[@ilahmaecunanan2629]

This show makes me speechless

[@alicehudson332]

Who won the case?

[@MelindaGopherOmnimedia]

I am Melinda Gopher, the woman in this episode. it is still being decided and it will be decided in federal court, where there is a 2019 case called Coeur D'Alene Tribe v. Hawks, No. 17-35755 (9th Cir. 2019), federal courts will enforce a tribal order over a state order. The episode did not show the in depth of legal facts, Mike and his group have already separated and petitioned as a separate group in 1992-1997 for federal recognition. Read the case: Bear Claw Tribe, Inc. v. United States, 36 Fed. Cl. 181, 187 (1996), after they were denied recognition at the federal level, they are attempting to defraud the estate of our late parents by stating they are part of this tribe. Because they were denied recognition at the Congressional level, a lower federal court cannot reverse as Congress has plenary power over Indian affairs. I expect the matter to be decided at the 9th Circuit level, as it was the court that made the Hawks ruling. I also want public to know that they are behaving as though we, Robert Gopher's heirs are "kicked out of the tribe." They are leaning on Ahontoays band lineage and history after they essentially terminated themselves on US Congress. There is no walking that back for them. Since this has consumed our lives for better part of a decade, it is time for the flag to come home where it belongs. We are Ahontoays and we set the membership rules for our band, no one else, not Congress and not federal courts, certainly not Mike! Also Marcus is a Cree Indian, and Cree are not among United States treaty tribes. Their leader and president of the state flag trust, Phyllis Parker, refused to be interviewed. She is the person who led the Bear Claw effort that resulted in their termination.

[@alicehudson332]

@@MelindaGopherOmnimedia Thank you for taking the time to speak about the matter. I pray that you and your family get the flag back where it belongs.