SongsForGrownups

All this morning, the more I thought about it, the madder I was getting.  I’m calmer now.  But here is a hypothesis.  An eyewitness reports having watched a Nez Perce tribal policeman being beaten up by a couple of unarmed white men on private property outside Tribal jurisdiction.   He asserts further that the officer pulled out his service pistol and shot both of them, one fatally.  What do you think happens next?

I can guarantee that if you ask this question to anyone with brown skin in Lapwai, Kamiah or Lewiston, they will answer that the cop would be brought up on charges within hours, and his name would be broadcast over all the media within a day.  We must hope never to have to test this hypothesis.

I understand that the FBI is now conducting a criminal investigation (according to the Lewiston Tribune).  I understand that ISP is conducting an internal administrative investigation to discern whether the (unnamed) state trooper “followed proper procedures”.

This I also understand: people on The Rez are afraid to drive on their own highways for fear that they too could be pursued and possibly harmed or even killed by a policeman who might be just looking for a reason.  Is this fear unjustified?  Maybe, maybe not.  But I believe there is only one way that it is even possible for any good to come out of this affair.  The unnamed Idaho State Policeman who killed Randall Vernon Ellenwood and gravely wounded Ricardo Daniel Rodriguez must be named as defendant in a criminal trial.  There are eyewitnesses.  There is evidence.  (If the police didn’t irrevocably compromise the scene tramping all over it while they waited for the Feds, that is.)  Yes, the witnesses will be less than objective.  I doubt anyone connected to this case is objective.  But even if the ISP finds the trooper did not “follow proper procedures” and just carries out an “internal” disciplinary action, never naming the officer or publicly stating their findings (in other words, buries it), or if the FBI finds “insufficient evidence” and rides off, we will never get the whole story.  Let him have his day in court.  Let the families of these men know that everything has been done to find the truth about their ordeal.   Let this community know that its authorities believe in equal treatment under the law.  Let every officer of the law know that there will be consequences for use of deadly force against unarmed defendants, and they’d better be very sure of their boundaries.  Let everyone in a position of power be certain that they will not get away with abusing it.

I don’t know.  That looks pretty close to impossible to me.  I’m not sure I believe, for instance, that our authorities do believe in equal treatment.  I think some are a bit more equal than others in the eyes of too many of our appointed guardians.  The rest?  Prove it, and prove all of us wrong.  I promise I’ll be delighted to admit it.

Monday evening, around 5:30 P.M., Randall Vernon Ellenwood and Ricardo Daniel Rodriguez were shot by an Idaho State trooper after a reported traffic violation, chase and “confrontation”.  Ellenwood died at the scene and Rodriguez remains in critical condition at St. Joseph Regional Medical Center.   As both men were Nez Perce Tribal members and the incident occurred on the Nez Perce Reservation, The FBI was called in as lead investigative agency.  All this we know from reports by KLEW-TV, The Lewiston Tribune, The Seattle Post-Intelligencer and Spokane’s  KREM-TV, whose exclusive interview with a witness gives more detailed information, and the only info that is not the official FBI line.  I know a little more, because my wife Leslie is a close friend of Vern’s wife Arleen Henry and was called to her side not long after the shooting. They waited for the agents to process the scene until about 3:45 A.M., when the body was finally released.

This is an opportunity for the Agency to generate a full and independent investigation and report of the shooting.  Nobody knows better than FBI how hostilities can escalate after incidents like this, and the community not only will demand, but will deserve, a complete accounting.

At least three questions will have to be answered.  First: were the suspects armed?  Everyone who knows Vern and Arleen (whose pickup Vern was driving), as well as every witness, already knows the answer to this one.   Second:  Why was the ISP trooper unaccompanied by Tribal police?  This was, as I understand it, their jurisdiction.  I believe this was also the subject of the dispute between the men and the trooper.  Third: whether or not Vern broke the law (which is entirely separate from this discussion), did either of these slightly-built and unarmed men ever pose a real threat to the life of the trooper, such that he was justified in using deadly force?  Was Vern just guilty of DWI (Driving While Indian)?  These are questions (except, of course, the first one, to which everyone knows the answer) which I assure you are being asked all over The Rez, and which, if they are not answered truthfully, completely and respectfully, will eventually fester, eroding even further the relations between the Indian and white communities, not to mention between the Indians and law enforcement agencies.

This is a reservation, where everyone pretty much knows everyone else.  They know things about each other that they often would probably rather not.  They also know when they are not getting the whole story.   I urgently recommend to Special Agent Juan Becerra that he make very sure, and with as little delay as possible, that they–that we all–get the whole, unvarnished, un-spun, absolutely unedited story.  Because memories can be long about these things.  Because everybody has a lot more to lose if you are not completely up front with us.  Because, God damn it, we deserve better.