Biden commutes Peltier's sentence

The news that former United States president Joe Biden was granting former American Indian Movement (AIM) member Leonard Peltier clemency to serve out the rest of his life sentence at home was unexpected for many across Turtle Island – including Denise Pictou Maloney, who believes that Peltier was complicit in the 1975 murder of her mother, Annie Mae Pictou in South Dakota.

“I was literally in the middle of my workday, and I’ve had to try to show up in my professional life when I’ve been given a gut-punch like that with no warning,” Pictou Maloney told The Eastern Door.

Peltier was given a life sentence in prison for the deaths of two Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents in June of 1975, during a shootout on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota.

Many organizations have stood behind Peltier throughout the years, including the Assembly of First Nations (AFN), which advocated for his extradition to Canada for 37 years, before passing a resolution to formally withdraw their support in July of last year.

That decision was made because of Peltier’s role in the interrogation of Pictou, also known as Pictou Aquash, and his public support of John Graham, who was convicted of her murder alongside Arlo Looking Cloud.

Many view Peltier as an activist unfairly imprisoned based on allegations that he had a flawed trial, with organizations like the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention stating that “he continues to be detained because he is Native American” in 2022.

“You can’t support Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG) when you’re upholding violent men who brought harm and violence,” Pictou Maloney said.

Pictou, originally Mi’kmaq from Nova Scotia, was also a member of AIM. She was active in the movement, participating in several prominent occupations, including at Wounded Knee.

Her body was found by the side of the highway on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation after the snow melted, having disappeared in December of the previous year. Though an initial autopsy determined that she had died from hypothermia, the family requested that her body be exhumed eight days after she was buried, and a second autopsy was undertaken. That autopsy, arranged by AIM, found that she had been shot, leading to an investigation by the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA).

No indictments were made until 2003, when Looking Cloud and Graham, both AIM members, were formally charged with her murder. Looking Cloud was convicted in 2004 and Graham in 2010, with prosecutors stating that Pictou was murdered because high-ranking AIM members believed she was an FBI informant.

Multiple witnesses testified that Peltier interrogated Pictou due to his suspicion that she was an informant, holding a gun to her head – Peltier admitted to interrogating her, but denied using a gun.

Pictou Maloney said that her mother had also told her aunts – Pictou’s sisters – that she was interrogated at gunpoint by Peltier the fall before her murder.

During the trial of Looking Cloud, individuals testified that Peltier had bragged about shooting the FBI agents, and Pictou’s knowledge of this is thought to be part of why she was suspected of being an informant.

Pictou Maloney also told The Eastern Door. that two other prominent AIM figures had told her at an event in 1999 that AIM members were engaged in her mother’s murder. 

“It’s well-documented throughout the trials that people talked about how something like this only could have happened if the leadership ordered it,” Pictou Maloney said.

“His participation in the conspiracy to take her out was very apparent and very well-documented.”

Pictou Maloney talked at length about her mother’s murder at the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigeous Women and Girls, and brought Don Barnaby, who is also Mi’kmaq, and now lives in Kahnawake, as her emotional support worker at the time.

“I sat behind her and just kept brushing her shoulders with my eagle wing to lighten the load, just smudging her too,” he said.

Barnaby said that knowledge of Peltier’s alleged involvement in Pictou’s murder is well-known in Mi’kmaq Country.

“Everybody knows. But there are so many people outside of Mi’kmaq territory that are uneducated about what really happened,” he said. “They think he’s this Indigenous hero who fell on the sword for AIM. But man, he was complicit. We as Mi’kmaq people know that, and we won’t forget that.”

Peltier – who could not be reached for comment via representatives by the time of The Eastern Door’s deadline – had his life sentence commuted mere moments before Biden left office before current president Donald Trump’s inauguration. 

The NDN Collective, a grassroots organization who led a campaign for Peltier’s release, said in a press release on Monday that the commutation is “the result of 50 years of intergenerational resistance, organizing, and advocacy.”

“Leonard Peltier’s liberation is our liberation – and while home confinement is not complete freedom, we will honour him by bringing him back to his homelands to live out the rest of his days surrounded by loved ones, healing, and reconnecting with his land and culture,” Nick Tilsen, NDN Collective founder and chief executive officer said in the statement.

“The commutation granted to Leonard Peltier is a symbol of our collective strength – and our resistance will never stop.”

The NDN Collective did not respond to The Eastern Door’s request for comment by deadline. 

Pictou Maloney said that she’s seen some fellow Onkwehón:we share their mixed feelings about the commutation – but that she perceives support for Peltier as upholding violence in Indigenous liberation movements.

“When you decide that you want to prioritize women and their safety, upholding violent men is a direct conflict. It sets a precedent that it’s okay to be violent, as long as you’re not caught and as long as there’s some kind of systemic cause,” she said.

“When men can rationalize supporting violent men while they’re trying to support ending violence against MMIWG, it makes no sense.”

Pictou Maloney, along with several former AIM members, participated in a four-part documentary series on Pictou’s life and murder, which was released on Disney+ earlier this month.

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