Brothers and sisters, did you know when you count the number of Lakota inmates in state and federal prisons, there are enough tribal members to create a tribe?

Many who are imprisoned would say they are “The Tribe Without a Name.” Despite being counted as enrolled tribal members for purposes of grant and federal funding, they receive little or no assistance from their tribes while they are in prison or upon reentry.

Unspoken for and hidden away even beneath the very conscious minds of our tribal officials, they suffer the cruelest fate of all. Denied even a place on the Red Road to share with their people, they are forced to walk alone. Some were once men and women revered and beloved by our people, now remembered and judged only for their mistakes.

There is something terribly wrong in a state which has a population of 8% Lakota but in whose state prisons Lakota men constitute 28% of all male offenders and Lakota women are 42% of all female offenders.

South Dakota has a long sorry history of racism and hatred towards the Lakota people. Very little has really changed since the 1880s when the state of South Dakota attempted to usurp the sovereign authority of the Sicangu Oyate to deal with its own tribal members. See Ex-Parte Crow Dog, 109 U.S. 556 (1883). South Dakota’s statistics smack of disparate treatment of the Lakota.

How many Lakota have felt the burning sting of oppression and racial profiling? Yes, I speak about prison as a former tribal judge and federal prosecutor. I know the system well. The criminal justice system in South Dakota is more like an exclusive “white man’s country club.” Forget rehabilitation, it’s about punishment and extracting a pound of flesh from the Lakota.

Take a look at the criminal justice system, state and federal. What a shameful lack of presence of Native Americans throughout except as defendants, offenders or victims. Our people are prosecuted by an almost all white army of prosecutors. Public defenders rarely have any Native Americans on staff.

In the heart of our beloved Black Hills, our Lakota place of origin, there isn’t a single state or federal judge who is an enrolled member of a federally recognized tribe. Are there any Lakota who believe that South Dakota juries are fair to the Lakota?

If you are a wealthy privileged white male like Bill Janklow, former Governor of South Dakota and former U.S. Representative, you can commit homicide, play the “diabetic defense” card, have the tax payers pick up your tab for $1 million dollars to pay the victims’ family under the Federal Tort Claims Act and still be a member of the South Dakota Bar Association. Many Lakota say this man takes pride in being compared to Custer. He and people like him have worked openly against Native Americans. There is no justice in “just us good old white boys.”

Over the years, how many of our ancestral leaders, Chiefs and warriors were imprisoned or lost their lives for their beliefs? Do we today among our Red people have those who are “forsaken and forgotten”? Several of our ancestors who were imprisoned or murdered in prison include, the great Heyoka Chief Crazy Horse killed by the U.S. government at Ft. Robinson; Chief Sitting Bull who was a captive at Ft. Yates before he was murdered while being arrested by Indian police who worked for the U.S. government; the fearless and great Heyoka Chief Rain-in-the-Face who was held captive by soldiers for a time and shackled to a ball and chain before he made a daring escape.

However, it wasn’t just the Northern Plains warriors or chiefs who were imprisoned or died in captivity. The great patriot of the Southwest, Geronimo, a Chiricahua Apache Chief, died in a military prison in Oklahoma, far from his beloved homeland.

Most of us know of Chief Geronimo but how many are aware that there were innocent Apache children who were also imprisoned by the U.S. government? In 1997 Mildred Cleghorn, the distinguished matriarchal Chairperson of the Chiricahua Apache Tribe passed on. Born in 1910, she had the distinction of being among the last Native American children to be born in captivity as a U.S. “prisoner of war.”

My grandfather , John Fire, Tahca Uste, taught that a true leader holds sacred the breath of all Lakota (Indian) people regardless of tribal affiliation. I have learned that this spirit of generosity is why the Lakota so freely welcomed and adopted the captives who were members of other tribes into the Lakota Oyate through the sacred “making of relatives ceremony,” the Hunka Ceremony. Chief Sitting Bull adopted an Assiniboine captive later named “Jumping Bull” as his brother and this brave man was killed along with Chief Sitting Bull in 1890.

According to traditional Lakota teaching, every person from the Chief on down to the youngest child was valued equally. From an early age, the elders taught the virtues of courage, fortitude, humility, honesty, generosity and wisdom to the youth and invested a substantial time teaching, nurturing, mentoring and preparing them for adulthood. Only the bravest and most virtuous of the young men who had proven themselves were invited to join the Akicita Warrior Societies.

As a result, our warriors were known for their courage and fearlessness and were regarded as formidable adversaries. During and after battle, many a courageous and fearless leader risked his life to retrieve those who had fallen, for they were valued even in death. Our traditional Lakota leaders and warriors were beloved by the Oyate (the people).

It was an honor for them to serve without pay, living a life of sacrifice and public service for the Oyate. If a leader or warrior was cowardly, unwise, unjust, stingy or dishonest, the people removed him from his position. True leadership entailed providing for and looking out for those who were the most vulnerable, including the young, the sick, the widows and the elderly.

I have learned from my Heyoka grandfather and Heyoka son that according to Native American spiritual teaching, there are no inferiors among our people. Each person deserves respect and is equal, male or female, including those deemed “outcasts” by society.

We cannot judge others for the Great Spirit made all of us and loves us all equally. Redemption is found not through another’s sacrifice or suffering but through one’s own individual effort and reconciliation with the Great Spirit. It has never been the Lakota way to exclude a person who has committed a wrong from participating in one of our sacred ceremonies.

The life of a traditional Lakota is one of a continual search to make things right with the creator. Our sweat lodge ceremony, one of seven sacred rites, allows us to purify ourselves and to pray, seek forgiveness and deal with guilt or other issues.

In the sweat lodge ceremony, it is not perfection that counts but intention and sincerity that only the Great Spirit sees and reveals through changed lives. Before we try to judge, remember that according to Native American spirituality, spiritual laws supersede man’s laws which are imperfect. Just because a secular rule or law is legal does not mean that it is just or moral.

Throughout history, we have seen leaders rise and fall. In fact an outcast of yesterday might be a hero today. Nelson Mandela, a man much admired by many, spent 27 years as a prisoner before he was released and became a leader for his people. The great Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte was exiled and imprisoned twice, spending the last six years of his life exiled on the British Isle of St. Helena.

One of the founding fathers of political science, the Italian humanist and writer, Niccolo Machieveli was imprisoned and tortured during his lifetime. Significantly for those who are Christian, almost all of Jesus’ disciples were imprisoned at one time or another and some were repeat offenders. Under our laws today, how many of these disciples would be serving life sentences in prison or executed?

The Governor of South Dakota has a “Governor’s Reentry Council” but I have not seen any evidence of much tribal involvement even though Native Americans are overrepresented in the corrections system. Is this leadership?

According to a report provided from a January 8, 2010 meeting of the South Dakota Governor’s Reentry Council, once released from prison, Native American males recidivated at a rate of 42% which is a much higher rate in comparison to 22.8 percent of the white population. This rate is unacceptable and tribal leaders should hold the state accountable. According to this Council, there is a need for “evidence based programming.”

What is that? There is evidence that what the state is doing is not working for Native Americans. Too many programs lack a Lakota cultural approach which is at the root of true rehabilitation.

Many so called “crimes” involve alcohol which is a disease. One should treat a disease, not kill the patient or put him or her away for life. All too often, the so called “faith based” Christian programs are favored by Corrections instead of Native American spirituality. This is discriminatory.

Maybe it’s time for tribes to certify their spiritual people as “Native American spiritual Men or Women” in order for them to have access to minister to our Lakota Oyate in South Dakota jails or prisons. Our traditional Lakota spiritual leaders should be allowed access to our people on at least an equal basis as the ministers or priests who are Christians.

Non-Indians do not seem to realize that the sweat lodge ceremony or “Inipi” is one of our 7 sacred Lakota rites and has been firmly rooted within our Lakota spirituality and culture for hundreds of years. It is the foremost of all of our sacred ceremonies and relevant to any rehabilitation which is faith based.

As humans, we are selfish but the sacred sweat lodge ceremony allows us to give not only from the body but also from the spirit. What leaves our bodies are the impurities, our “wrong doings.” We give back through our presence and prayers, our love and support for one another. The sweat lodge has helped many who face a life of incarceration to have hope and to seek forgiveness. The sweat lodge is “Lakota faith based.”

It is sad that in prisons today we have young people who are giving up. I heard a young man in an Oklahoma prison say “If you are Red, you are dead.” Some of them have told me that they feel condemned for one mistake and judged for the rest of their lives. I hear them talk about being forgotten and abandoned by their tribes.

This is not in accordance with traditional Native American spiritual beliefs or Christian teachings. It takes a courageous leader to acknowledge that anybody can make a mistake and that we all have an obligation to extend a hand to help these fallen warriors. We should not kick somebody when they are down. Most importantly, Native American prisoners who are tribal members retain their tribal identity while they are in prison.

In 2005, before he passed, a traditional Lakota spiritual leader, John Around Him, spoke of a dream that he had which was to turn the tide of incarceration around. As Lakota we often speak about how we are all related, “Mitakuye Oyasin.” Our Lakota kinship is a spiritual relationship which man’s laws cannot sever. Mr. Around Him was right when he said “we all have relatives who are in prison.”

Tribal leadership should note that there are at least 977 Native American offenders in South Dakota state prisons who are in need of help, not including those who are in the federal system and are held out of state in several different prisons. Nowhere in any tribal Constitution does it say that a person is deprived of their tribal identity when they enter prison.

Moreover, it should be remembered that each tribe counts these enrolled tribal members as part of their statistics when applying for grants or federal funding and they are tribal members. Even if these offenders are not enrolled with your tribe, it is the spiritual way to help those who are down and out. How many tribal leaders have a heart big enough to include those who are outside of their own tribal affiliation?

Our brothers and sisters who are in prison need strong advocates for them to serve on the Governor’s Council for Reentry in a meaningful way, not just “tokenism.” Our people need tribal input and support for re-entry programs, jobs, not more discrimination when they get out.

While in prison, they need Native American volunteers for religious services, cultural and educational activities and mentoring. As part of their rehabilitation, the inmates use the sweat lodge, making it is important that traditional Lakota spiritual leaders come in to teach the proper protocols and help with these ceremonies from time to time.

Who among the spiritual leaders is willing to approach tribal councils to obtain help? Within each tribe there should also be people who are responsible for monitoring and checking on the inmates who are being held out of state in federal prisons.

At the present time, I don’t know of a single tribe who is doing this. Financial and other support for travel and expenses is needed for those who are willing to minister to our people in prison. The inmates also need donations on a regular basis for the wood, stones, sage, sweet grass, tarps and other supplies, not on a one time basis.

I’ve been involved with trying to protect the religious rights of our people since 2005. Pila maya ye (thank you) for helping to see that those who have fallen receive some help and attention.

Wambli Sina Win (Eagle Shawl Woman) is currently an Associate Professor and Director of the Bacone College Criminal Justice Studies Department in Muskogee, Oklahoma. Her grandfather was John Fire, Chief Lame Deer Tahca Uste, a well known Lakota Holy Man from the Rosebud Sioux Indian Reservation in South Dakota. One of her sons is also a medicine man. She has served as a Tribal Judge for the Oglala Sioux Tribal Court, as an Assistant U.S. Attorney, a Tribal Attorney and as a legal Instructor for the U.S. Indian Police Academy at Artesia, N.M. You may contact Wambli Sina Win, J.D. at wamblisinawin@yahoo.com She can be reached at wamblisinawin@yahoo.com.

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