John,
After the occupation at Wounded Knee fifty years ago, the FBI harassed members of the American Indian Movement (AIM) and people at the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation for years -- including when a massive shootout in 1975 ended with three people dead: a young Native man and two FBI agents.
AIM activist Leonard Peltier was there that day, and was arrested despite a complete lack of evidence connecting him to the FBI agents’ deaths. Leonard Peltier is still serving time in a maximum security prison 48 years later.
Peltier continues to maintain his innocence -- and there’s a LOT of evidence to back him up. We now know that the FBI coerced witnesses and threatened their families to get false statements, all of which the witnesses later recanted. The FBI also withheld key evidence showing that the bullets that killed the FBI officers did not come from Peltier’s gun. And during the trial, one of the jurors even admitted to prejudice against Peltier for being Native.
It's time President Biden commutes Peltier's sentence and grants him clemency so he can live out the rest of his life with his family on his ancestral homelands. Please sign the petition to President Biden and urge him to do the right thing.
A former FBI agent familiar with his case has written to President Biden asking to release Peltier. A former federal prosecutor who oversaw Peltier’s post-trial sentencing and appeals also wrote to Biden asking for clemency, saying: “I have realized that the prosecution and continued incarceration of Mr. Peltier was and is unjust. We were not able to prove that Mr. Peltier personally committed any offense on the Pine Ridge Reservation.”
This misconduct and constitutional violations have stolen years from Peltier’s life. At 78 years old, he is the longest-serving political prisoner in the U.S. He suffers from many health issues including diabetes and kidney disease, and his condition has worsened since getting COVID last year in prison.
UN experts, U.S. Congressmembers, Amnesty International, the Democratic National Committee's Native American Caucus, the National Caucus of Native American State Legislators, the National Congress of American Indians, human rights leaders, and many others are calling for Peltier to be released.
The only way Leonard Peltier can get his freedom restored is through public pressure on President Biden. Are you with us?
Sign the petition to President Biden and demand the release of Leonard Peltier from prison now.
Sign now »
This is Leonard Peltier’s last and best hope for freedom.
Thank you,
LeftNet
