The continuing drama of the Picayune Rancheria of Chukchansi Indians of Northern California and the issue of which faction is the tribe’s legal authority, in charge its casino continues to play out in the courts.
Arrests have been made and charges filed against members of a 15-member group that conducted an armed raid into the casino and offices of the 815-member tribe, which owns the Chukchansi Gold Resort & Casino in Coarsegold.
John Oliveira, the tribal police chief accused of organizing the raid and who turned himself in to the authorities last week, has accused Madera County Sheriff John Anderson of corruption. Oliveira says his security forces unearthed documents implicating the sheriff during the October 9 raid. Oliveira is a former assistant special agent with the Bureau of Indian Affairs who also served six years in Iraq with a counterinsurgency unit.
He no longer has possession of those documents that, he says, show that the sheriff was given free meals, a condo and, “something in regards to $200,000,” he says.
Because of the raid, a federal judge ordered the Chukchansi Gold Resort & Casino closed due to a threat to the safety of casino customers and employees. The National Indian Gaming Commission had previously ordered the casino closed because the tribe had not filed required audits for several years.
The raid, conducted at the command and with the participation of “Tex” McDonald, who claims to be the legal tribal chairman, was dubbed “Operation Sovereign Return.” According to one report, they had an attorney with them to make sure they stayed within the law.
According to David Leibowitz, a spokesman for the McDonald faction, “This was not some kind of posse or a gang of thugs. It was a carefully orchestrated action operating under the authority of a legal tribal government.”
Sheriff Anderson denies that the McDonald group, which was not recognized by the state as a law enforcement agency, had the legal authority to conduct such a raid. “They had the same authority as a private citizen,” he said.
Anderson says he is “really surprised” by the accusation and says he has tried to remain neutral during the ongoing feuding within the tribe.
The tribal police chief claims that he was within his legal rights to organize the raid during which his men took other security officers into custody for several hours, in some cases handcuffing them. Oliveira claims he got authorization from Madera County District Attorney Michael Keitz, in spite of the fact that the DA authorized his arrest warrant.
The police chief made his accusations during an interview with the Sacramento Bee, during which he said he was gathering evidence in his own behalf and looking after the financial well being of his large family before turning himself in.
Because the contending tribal factions have yet to make peace, the casino remains closed by U.S. District Judge Lawrence J. O’Neill and the California Attorney General.
O’Neill recently ordered all of the documents seized in the October 9 raid returned to the tribal offices. Oliveira contends that the raid was conducted to recover the audit materials that the NIGC was demanding and to lay hands on evidence of the corruption of Sheriff Anderson. He claims Keitz gave him the go ahead without telling him that he could be accused of kidnapping and other felonies.
The District Attorney filed charges against Oliveira and 14 members of his group, including McDonald, on October 31. The raiding party consisted of some tribal police and others who Oliveira knew were experience in police work and the military. Some were from out of state. One of these was Benjamin James Rhodes, a 40-year old martial arts instructor operating out of South Carolina, who was recently arrested and is facing extradition to California.
The intent was not to cause a problem with casino patrons, or to take over the casino, but only to acquire the needed documents, says Oliveira. The security officers of the opposing faction were taken prisoner because they were armed, he claims and because one of them resisted using a stun gun.
In addition to accusing the county sheriff of corruption, Oliveira said the McDonald faction thinks Anderson has shown favoritism by not arresting any members of the other factions contending for power in the tribal, including some who Oliveira alleges used stun guns on a member of his tribal police.
The Sacramento Bee interviewed Sheriff Anderson last week. He denied ever taken free meals or money or having a condo paid for by the tribe. He said he has done everything he could to remain neutral and had previously filed reports critical of all three factions as far back as two years ago.
He told the newspaper that the department had “been placed in the position of determining who’s in charge. Again, this is not our role and we have tried to avoid it, each time urging the sides to come to an agreement. In some cases, we have urged state or federal officials to act. Again, unfortunately, in most instances solutions were not arrived at, requested assistance was not provided, and the conflicts continue … we have strived to maintain neutrality.”
He points out that one of the contending factions, the Lewis group, filed a $5 million lawsuit against him, later dismissed. Another member of that group asked the Madera County grand jury to investigate the sheriff.
At the most recent court session regarding the raid, bail was set for McDonald at $2.4 million, raised from $1 million because he has two prior strikes dating back to the 1990s, with bails for his confederates set at $800,000 apiece. Nine of those with warrants on them are as yet not in custody. The four men who were arraigned, including Tex McDonald, Vernon King, Tyrone Bishop and Miguel Ramos, all pleaded not guilty to charges of kidnapping and assault.
Outside of the council one of the leaders of Lewis-Ayala faction, Reggie Lewis, told reporters, “It was very frightening because when you have a gun pulled on you and pointed at you, your life is in jeopardy to the ultimate right there. You don’t know what these people are going to do.”
Meanwhile members of the tribe are trying unsuccessfully to muster a quorum for conducting tribal business in the face of the impasse. The tribe’s constitution requires that 35 percent of the membership be present at a general council meeting in order to conduct business. That is the only way to circumvent the requirement that the council conduct tribal business. Three groups claim to be the council.
About 150 members attended the last such meeting, with 280 required to conduct business. Representatives of the Morris Reid and Lewis Ayala factions attended. No one from the Tex McDonald faction attended, possibly because McDonald is currently in jail with a $2.4 million bond—recently raised from $1 million—required to set him free. Or possibly, as one member asserted, because the Lewis and Ayala group had previously illegally set themselves up as running the casino.
If McDonald were able to attend, he probably wouldn’t have much to say since he was involved in a fight while in custody in the Madera County jail, and suffered a broken jaw.
The Reid group last week proposed sort of a “coalition” governing body with two members from each group, to reopen the casino. Lewis responded, “I think everyone realizes we have to come together to make this work.”
Reid agreed, “We just have to come together and get this done in way that’s best for the tribe.”
