United States v. Lara

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United States v. Lara, 541 U.S. 193 (2004) was a case where the United States Supreme Court held that an American Indian could be prosecuted by both an Indian tribe and the United States government without implicating the Double Jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment.

Background

Duro case

In 1990, the Supreme Court decided Duro v. Reina,[1] which held that an Indian tribe did not have jurisdiction to try a non-tribal member for a crime that was committed on the reservation.[2]

Facts of the case

Billy Jo Lara was a member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians who in 2001 lived with his wife on the Spirit Lake Reservation.[3] His wife was a member of the Spirit Lake Tribe.[fn 1] After several incidents of misconduct, Lara was excluded from the reservation. Lara returned to the reservation on June 13, 2001 and was arrested for public intoxication.[4] After being transported to the police station, Lara was informed of the exclusion order. Lara then struck Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) Police Officer Byron Swan.[3][4]

Footnotes

  1. The tribe was a Sisseton Wahpeton band of the Dakota people.

References

  1. Duro v. Reina,   495 U.S. 676 (1990).
  2. Pommersheim, Frank [2009]. Broken Landscape : Indians, Indian Tribes, and the Constitution: Indians, Indian Tribes, and the Constitution. Oxford University Press, 251. ISBN 9780199706594. 
  3. 3.0 3.1 Williams, Robert A. [2005]. Like a Loaded Weapon: The Rehnquist Court, Indian Rights, And the Legal History of Racism in America. University of Minnesota Press, 153. ISBN 9781452907567. 
  4. 4.0 4.1 United States v. Lara,   2001 WL 1789403, *1 (D.N.D. Nov. 29, 2001).