Indians face jail in casino dispute

OMAHA, Neb. -- No member of an American Indian tribe has spent time in jail over a gambling dispute since Congress first allowed tribes to negotiate gambling compacts with states 11 years ago.

That could change Friday.

If 11 members of the Santee Sioux Tribal Council are jailed for contempt of court -- which some expect -- it will be the first time Indians are imprisoned because of an impasse since passage of the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act of 1988.

The dispute started in February 1996 when the tribe first opened its Ohiya Casino. The tribe filed a lawsuit on opening day accusing the state of not negotiating in good faith on a gambling compact. The act requires states to negotiate such agreements with tribes to set rules and limits on gambling.

Santee leaders face possible jail time because they refuse to pay court-ordered fines of $6,000 per day for operating the casino on their reservation in northeast Nebraska.

Each member of the Tribal Council is to appear in federal court Friday for disobeying U.S. District Judge William Cambridge's orders to close the casino or pay the fines. The tribal leaders could leave the courtroom in handcuffs, attorneys on both sides said.

"I don't feel they have the right to do that," Tribal Chairman Butch Denny said. "We are a sovereign nation."

Santee leaders say the tribe needs casino gambling to boost the economic well-being of its 2,500 members. In a state where the unemployment rate is one of the nation's lowest at 2.5 percent, the reservation struggles with a rate of 74 percent.

The casino, which employs about 25 people, has 70 slot machines that brought in more than $900,000 last year.

"We look at this solely as a way to provide economic opportunity for our people," Roger Trudell, the tribe's treasurer, said.

Nebraska officials say casino-style gambling is not allowed anywhere else in the state, and they do not want to make an exception to the law.

U.S. Attorney Tom Monaghan said the tribe has exhausted its options. Meanwhile, the Ohiya Casino remains open and none of the fines have been paid.

National experts say no tribal member has been jailed over the issue. And such disputes should never reach a point where tribal leaders face the threat of jail, Sheila Morago of the Indian Gaming Association in Washington, D.C., said.

A 1992 confrontation over Indian gambling in Arizona came the closest to landing tribal members in jail after the FBI sent trucks to the state's six reservations to confiscate slot machines.

At the Ft. McDowell Mohave-Apache Indian Community near Phoenix, tribal members used bulldozers to block trucks loaded with gambling equipment from leaving the reservation. They relented, but six months later they reached a compact with the state.

The Santee have applied for a compact under new procedures initiated by Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt. Those rules allow tribes to negotiate with the Interior Department in states where government officials are resistant to gaming compacts.

Federal courts have yet to rule if the federal agency can serve as or appoint a mediator to work out gambling disputes.

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