A longtime dispute regarding tribal rights was recently decided by the New Mexico Supreme Court, ruling that tribal courts have jurisdiction over personal injury and property damage brought lawsuits against Native American casinos.
The case dates back to 2016 when an electrical company employee claimed he was severely injured while making a delivery at a Pojoaque Pueblo casino. The New Mexico Court of Appeals reversed a lower court ruling calling for dismissal, but the tribe then asked the state’s high court to determine jurisdiction.
In its ruling, the court cited two federal cases that ended a gaming compact provision waiving sovereign immunity to allow some damage claims to be moved from tribal court to state court. One of the cases was a personal injury claim involving over-serving alcohol at Santa Ana Pueblo’s casino. The other case was filed in state court by a visitor who slipped and fell at the Navajo Nation’s casino in northwestern New Mexico.
Attorney Richard Hughes, who filed a brief on behalf of Santa Ana and Santa Clara pueblos, with seven other pueblos signing on said, “We’ve been fighting state court jurisdiction over these cases for 20 years and so it’s the end of a long struggle to keep state courts out of determining tribal affairs.”
Hughes and others have noted the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act has no provisions that allow Congress to authorize state courts to have jurisdiction over personal injury claims.
Additionally, responding to people who said individuals suing tribal gaming operations could face discrimination in tribal court, Hughes stated tribal courts are “perfectly competent to handle cases like this in a very fair and equitable fashion.”
