DAPL Donates $15 Million Payoff for Police Abuse of Water Protectors at Standing Rock

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Photo Rob Wilson

In an egregious act of a private corporation paying for police brutality, Dakota Access Pipeline gives North Dakota $15 million

By Brenda Norrell

Censored News

Dakota Access Pipeline has given the State of North Dakota $15 million for bringing in police who carried out excessive force to ensure the construction of its pipeline at Standing Rock.

Those police and National Guard -- orchestrated by Morton County Sheriff Kyle Kirchmeier and TigerSwan mercenaries -- shot peaceful water protectors with rubber bullets and tear gas, blasted them with water cannons in freezing temperatures, beat them, and imprisoned them in dog cages with numbers written on their arms as was done by the Nazis.

Now, in an egregious act of a corporation paying for the abuse of peaceful protesters, and the violation of their civil and human rights, which resulted in serious injury, the State of North Dakota has received its payoff from the private corporation Dakota Access Pipeline, owned by Energy Transfer Partners in Texas.

Native Americans and their allies are protecting the Missouri River, the source of drinking water for millions, from the oil pipeline, which was approved during the Obama Administration, and propelled forward by the Trump Administration.

North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum says Dakota Access donated $15 million to North Dakota's Department of Emergency Services “to help reimburse the state for the money it spent responding to the Dakota Access Pipeline protests.”

The donation was wired to the Bank of North Dakota Thursday and will be used to pay down the loans taken out the Department of Emergency Services (DES), KFRYTV reports.

Los Angeles Times reports, “The state has arranged for a bank credit line of up to $43 million to cover policing costs, including $5 million just added this week. Maj. Gen. Alan Dohrmann, who heads the North Dakota National Guard, has said costs shouldn't go past that figure.”

Meanwhile in North Dakota, the biased media continues its support of these criminal acts by the State of North Dakota, Morton County and police.

In international news today, The Intercept reports on DAPL surveillance for police over Standing Rock water protectors.

The private oil pipeline corporation worked with police using a privately-owned yellow helicopter and used this stalking, with prosecutors, as evidence against them in court.
.https://theintercept.com/2017/09/29/standing-rock-dakota-access-pipeline-dapl-no-fly-zone-drones-tigerswan/

Below: Today's The Intercept. A police officer shoots at a drone at Standing Rock.
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North Dakota Governor's statement on $15 million wire transfer

Thursday, September 28, 2017 - 06:00 pm

BISMARCK, N.D. – Dakota Access Pipeline LLC has donated $15 million to the North Dakota Department of Emergency Services (DES) to help retire debt incurred by the state as a result of its response to the Dakota Access Pipeline protests, Gov. Doug Burgum announced today.

The donation, wired this afternoon to the state-owned Bank of North Dakota, will be used to pay down loans taken out by DES.

Continue reading:

https://www.governor.nd.gov/news/dakota-access-donates-15m-pay-down-loans-related-pipeline-protest-response

Leonard Peltier Legal Update Sept. 30, 2017

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By International Leonard Peltier Defense Committee

Censored News

Dear Friends and Family,

I want to thank you for all the generous donations that have come in for Leonard’s legal team, almost 9,500 dollars in the last 2 weeks. It is wonderful and shows what we can do to help Leonard’s lawyers to move forward. Which means we must continue to raise funds to make this happen. I want to share with you part of the strategy the lawyers have put together to gain Leonard’s freedom!

From the desk of the attorney:

“Release

_There are three paths to consider in an effort to obtain Leonard’s release. The first is a renewed petition for habeas corpus on the grounds that Leonard’s incarceration is unconstitutional. There are many obstacles here, both legal and logistical. New grounds (not previously raised in any appeal) would have to be discovered to be able to file a petition that is meritorious and would be considered by the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals. As a practical matter, locating the complete records all of previous appeals may be difficult as it appears that over the years they have been distributed to different attorneys. It might become necessary to obtain them from the court clerks directly but there is no guarantee they will be available. _

_ Secondly, after consultation with experts in the area of federal parole, it may be possible to renew Leonard’s petition within the next two years. This may be the most promising path as it would provide the most opportunity to present the factors related to racial discrimination, the illegal FBI counter-intelligence operations in the 1970’s against AIM, the coercive and underhanded tactics of the FBI during the investigation leading to Leonard’s arrest and conviction, his health issues and the sufficiency of his sentence at this point. _

_ Third, is the possibility of a “compassionate release” based on his declining health. This is an administrative issue handled with the Bureau of Prisons. Again, I have spoken with experts in the area who advise that generally, compassionate releases are intended for prisoners with terminal illnesses. I am happy to say that Leonard in my view is far from the end of his days, however, he does have significant health issues, and that combined with the time he has been incarcerated this may be a sufficient basis._

As I mentioned above, other than general guidelines that apply to all inmates there are no definitive regulations regarding the granting of a compassionate release from which we can determine that Leonard does, or does not, qualify. Each situation is weighed on a case by case basis. Leonard’s medical condition does make a release on this basis possible, although the hiring of outside medical experts may be necessary as his present condition will undoubtedly be open to interpretation for any consideration of compassionate release.

I am including the URL link to an article that will provide additional information regarding efforts to pressure the Bureau of Prisons to expand its granting of compassionate releases.

http://reason.com/blog/2017/07/28/congress-wants-to-know-why-the-bop-wont

I hope this information will help you see the urgency of our request for donations to Leonard’s legal team.

On the medical front, Leonard is recovering slowly from the heart surgery as lock downs, visits canceled and the new elder unit has him stressed. His grandson Cyrus & his son went to visit Leonard (Thanks to the Rosenberg Fund for Children) last weekend. Cyrus checked before he left to make sure visiting was on “YES, they said” but when Cyrus got to the prison on Saturday morning he was told visit were canceled for the day and he should call Saturday night to see if they would be open on Sunday. Sunday, it was closed, he called Sunday night for Monday, visits were canceled yet again. Both Cyrus, his son and Leonard missed a chance to be a family for the weekend. Leonard was very upset as he say’s “time is too short for me, and to not see my great grandson is very upsetting.”

Leonard has very few pleasures in life, the most important is his visits with family and friends. It is imperative for us to continue to push his struggle forward. We need to stay focused and dedicated in order to right this grave injustice.

With Respect and Thank you for your support for Leonard's struggle for freedom,
Paulette

www.whoisleonardlpeltier.info

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Indigenous Women From Standing Rock And Allies On Divestment Delegation In Europe

Indigenous Women From Standing Rock And Allies

On Divestment Delegation In Europe

By WECAN

PRESS RELEASE - Indigenous Women From Standing Rock And Allies On Divestment Delegation In Europe

Censored News

Update September 28, 2017

Media Contact:

Emily Arasim (general inquiries) – emily@wecaninternational.org, +1(505)920-0153

Osprey Orielle Lake (urgent inquiries in Europe) – osprey@wecaninternational.org, +1(415)722-2104

Michelle Cook (general inquiries) - divestinvestprotect@gmail.com

SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA, California (September 20, 2017) – From September 30th through October 14th, 2017, a delegation of Indigenous women from across the United States who have been at the forefront of the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) resistance effort and other movements to stop fossil fuel extraction and infrastructure which pose threats to Indigenous and human rights, self-determination, lands and culture will travel to Norway, Switzerland and Germany. The delegation will urge financial institutions to divest from and cancel credit facilities with pipeline companies that endanger rights and neglect Indigenous People’s right to Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC) as outlined in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Indigenous Demand Answers -- Three Years since 43 Students Vanished in Guerrero

For those of us on the Zapatista caravan through Mexico, there was no question that in the State of Guerrero there was a power, a fierceness, like non other. On our bus, the Sonoran bus, with O'odham, Yaqui and Mayo, there was a young Nahuatl warrior from Guerrero. He hopped on one leg, with a stick cane in one hand. When the call for "security" rang out, he rushed to the front line. I asked him why he had came, he said, "There was no food in our village." Now, years later, those forces in Mexico, co-opted and empowered by the United States government in their drug enterprises and fake media drug war, have attempted to squelch that power. But in doing so, they have only given birth to a new generation of warriors. -- Brenda, Censored News https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2017/09/indigenous-demand-answers-three-years.html

Declaration from the National Indigenous Congress and the Indigenous Governing Council Three Years after the Disappearance of 43 Students from the Isidro Burgos Rural Teaching College of Ayotzinapa

To the fathers and mothers of the 43 student compañeros of Ayotzinapa disappeared by the bad government:

To the people of Mexico:

To the people of the world:

To the National and International Sixth:

Three years after the Mexican government disappeared 43 sources of hope, we as the National Indigenous Congress embody the pain, indignation, and rage that lives and will continue to live until our student compañeros of the Isidro Burgos Rural Teaching College Raul of Ayotzinapa, Guerrero, are returned. The demand to find them alive maintains us in unity with their parents and compañeros.

The student compañeros are still disappeared and the State has merely placed its bets on their being forgotten and on disdain for memory. It has wagered on destruction, and from the ruins we, men and women, will reconstruct conscience, hope, and a new world.

Our call is for the reconstruction of this country, and in order to reconstruct ourselves along with it we need the return of our student compañeros of the Raul Isidro Burgos Rural Teaching College and the thousands of disappeared for whom Mexico below searches  without ceasing, reconstructing from that effort truth and justice.

We repeat our words for those who are not with us, for those who are, and for those who are yet to come. We struggle and will continue to struggle for the return of our student brothers and sisters of Ayotzinapa to the end. They were taken alive; we demand them back alive!

We convoke all those who to make up the people of Mexico, the originary peoples, barrios, nations, and tribes and non-indigenous peoples from the countryside and the city, to continue the struggle to  bring them home alive and punish the guilty.

We call upon everyone to participate in the marches and mobilizations convoked by the mothers and fathers of the 43 disappeared from the Isidro Burgos Rural Teaching College of Ayotzinapa, Guerrero, three years after this crime committed by the State.

September 26, 2017

For the Full Reconstitution of our Peoples

Never Again a Mexico Without Us

National Indigenous Congress

Indigenous Governing Council