South Dakota Supreme Court Upholds Indian Activist’s Rioting Conviction

The state Supreme Court on Friday upheld the convictions of Indian activist Dennis Banks for rioting and assault during a 1973 courthouse disturbance.

The high court ruled unanimously that Banks received a fair trial in 1975 when a jury convicted him of rioting while armed and assault with a dangerous weapon.

Banks, who was a fugitive for nine years before surrendering in 1984, left prison on work release in September after serving about a year for the convictions. He was placed on parole in December and has been working as an alcohol and drug abuse counselor at the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.

Banks said he does not plan to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. “I appealed, the Supreme Court upheld the conviction, and that’s that.”

After Banks was convicted by a Custer County jury in July, 1975, he fled the state before being sentenced and remained a fugitive for nine years, first in California and later on an Indian reservation in New York. He turned himself in to South Dakota authorities in 1984 and was sentenced to three years in prison.

The Feb. 6, 1973, riot began after Banks and other American Indian Movement leaders went to Custer to urge authorities to charge a white man, Daryld Schmitz, with murder for the stabbing death of an Indian, Wesley Bad Heart Bull. Schmitz was charged with manslaughter and was later acquitted of that charge.