Hunter Cousin A'amokat raises some good points in our comment section that I though deserved a promotion to a full post. It has to do with getting a fair and impartial hearing from the Pechanga Enrollment Committee. Disenrollment of hundreds of Pechanga people by three despicable people. (AKA the 3rd Pechanga Massacre) Do you think that black South Africans got fair hearing from their white rulers under apartheid? Would Americans expect a fair and impartial hearing from Iran?
A'amokat: Article V of the Temecula Band's constitution and bylaws, sometimes referred to as the Pechanga Band of Mission Indians,says:
"IT SHALL BE THE DUTY OF ALL ELECTED OFFICIALS OF THE BAND TO UPHOLD AND ENFORCE THE CONSTITUTION, BYLAWS, AND ORDINANCES OF THE TEMECULA BAND OF LUISENO MISSION INDIANS; AND ALSO, TO UPHOLD THE INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS OF EACH MEMBER WITHOUT MALICE OR PREJUDICE."
Irehne Scearce and Ruth Masiel are the sisters of Raymond Basquez Sr, who submitted a statement against our tribal membership, and they were closely related to at least ten other people who submitted and/or signed another letter that was against our tribal membership.
Francis Miranda was also closely related to a person who signed the letter against our membership and these three women were party to a challenge of our membership that was submitted against us before any evidence was even presented that would have warrented opening up an investigation against us.
I know I have posted this information about a million times and I have asked the following question just as many times.
How was allowing those three women to sit in judgement of us and to rule on our fate in our disenrollment case not malice or predjudice against us and how does it not violate the equal protection clause of the Band's constitution and bylaws under Article V?
We can document what I have stated by at least six letters that were sent to the enrollment committee and/or the tribal council asking for the recusal of those three women from participating in our disenrollment case but our request was ignored by both the committee and the council. How fair is that?
OP: Here is some pertinent information from a previous A'amokat post:
1. Applications that had the required number of signatures for approval (6) but were never processed. When confronted with this a committee member who was responsible for processing new applicants, a descendant of Candarlaria Nesecat Flores, replied, “I don’t care if it has 24 signatures on it, if I don’t think there is a bloodline, I’m not processing it.” OP: Frances Miranda was a descendent of Flores, and was on the enrollment committee.
2. Some 40 applications of children of enrolled tribal members were banded and set aside so they would not be processed because the committee members from the CPP faction of the tribe, who to that point had controlled the committee by having a majority, had no intention of enrolling these children. OP: Keeping children from their rightful place in the tribe. Their lineal descent was proven. This created a virtual moratorium on membership.
3. The new committee members found that there were families where one sibling was enrolled and another was not, even though both submitted identical applications at the same time.
4. Applications that were placed in the moratorium, even though the applications were submitted prior to the deadline, and the individuals had repeatedly contacted the committee to follow up on their status.
5. Refusal to sign enrollment applications or birth certificates for individuals who are members of families they don’t like
We keep working to get the story out front, the unethical tribal council of Pechanga hides behind the cloak of sovereignty. Would people stand up for Wal-Mart is they cut wages and cut all health coverage? NO, they'd exercise their moral outrage and quit shopping at Wal-Mart. Shouldn't the same be done at Pechanga, which has cut of rightful per capita payments, health care, educational assistance, the right to be buried with family at Pechanga cemetary...
New members of the enrollment committee elected in 2002, including a member of the Hunter family, had made those allegations in the second part of this article against those three women in question but those women were still allowed to sit in judgement of our family's fate, another clear conflict of interest and it was a travesty of justice that they were not recused from our case.
ReplyDeleteMark Macarro said in the commercial that Pechanga put on T.V. prior to the Without a Tribe news segment that we were afforded fairness.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gVe3i6kte0&feature=player_embedded
So Mr. Macarro and our resident tribal hack critic, how again were we afforded fairness?
People may think we are unfairly attacking, attacking, attacking people over and over again because we are bitter.
But it isn't about personal bitterness on our part it is about fairness verses unfairness and about the rule of law verses injustice.
So if what we are saying is untrue, then why don't they sue us for liable?
And, as I said, we can document that the tribal council and the enrollment committee were informed of the descrepencies but even if the allegations against the committee members in question were unfounded the fact that they were made by a Hunter family member was reason enough for them to step aside from ruling in the Hunter family case let alone the fact that they were closely related to witnesses against us.
Any real court would have thrown out this case on the above grounds alone.
Thank you OP once again for bringing these truths to light.
ReplyDeleteHas anyone previously brought up the fact that the majority of the Pechanga tribe voted to stop the dis-enrollment proceedings, when the question was called to a vote?
Yet, even after a landslide vote to stop all dis-enrollment processes our very own Tribal government continued against the people's wishes. And continued to put the families through a Kangaroo court. The individuals who put our family through this trial have no expertise in looking at any type of documentation and dismissed an expert's findings. We couldn't have a lawyer even at this so called hearing.
Give our family a real court and a real hearing and we will see who is wrong and who is right. who is real and who is fake....
We've brought the issue up many times. And in order to maintain a spotlight, we keep bringing the issue up so as not to let it fade.
ReplyDeleteAll readers are encouraged to look through our archives on the right sidebar.
There is also an option to SHARE each post to twitter and Facebook up at the top. Please help us spread the word.
Below is an excerpt from a letter dated February 25, 2003 to the tribal council from members of the enrollment committee who were elected to the enrollment committee in 2002, including a member of the Hunter family, that shows the response from four women on the enrollment committee after the new members of the committee would not compromise and do business as usual.
ReplyDelete"It is clear that much of the conflict on the committee stems from the fact that we have refused to compromise our integrity and participate in actions that we know contradict the Band's bylaws, policies, and procedures. The net result has been that these women took it upon themselves to serve us with "illegal" disenrollment letters (November 12, 2002), voted to disenroll us without documentation (November 18-20, 2002), enlisted members of the tribe to bring forward so-called documents for disenrollment of our families (December 10, 2002) and served us with a second "illegal" disenrollment letter (February 18, 2003) when we dared ask for a fair process. A process, by the way, for which the committee had already set a precedent."
What was one of the things the newly elected enrollment committee members refused to compromise on?
Not enrolling people who never should have ended up in the moratorium.
Those women are identified in this letter as Irhene Scearce, Ruth Masiel, Francis Miranda, and Margaret Duncan-who resigned from the committee before the M Miranda and Hunter disenrollments.
But the other three of these four women were the people who voted to disenroll us and they were the deciding votes in the case against us who got their family members and friends to submit testimony against us when their first direct challenge of our tribal membership was turned down.
The excerpt was from just one of six letters over a two year period to the tribal council and/or the enrollment committee detailing that those committee members who voted us out of the tribe should have been recused from our case and it is part of the evidence that we submitted during our disenrollment.
MARK MACARRO AND TRIBAL HACK, DUE PROCESS? NO WAY!
If Pechanga wants to be creditable, They would be wise to part ways with Kandy and Robert Edwards.I read that letter and if anyone thinks Robert Edwards could write such a letter, they are wrong. He couldn't find his way out of a paper bag. His lovely wife does all his thinking for him. What a sorry bunch.For every letter she writes , I write 2.All that woman thinks night and day is $$$ She got all those people disenrolled, because she thinks she is so smart. Someone needs to check into their past.
ReplyDeleteAnonymus Dec.7, 6.09 pm
ReplyDeleteWhat letter are you talking about?
Please explain.
Just so you know, I think you are wrong, Robert and Kandy Edwards are2 of the finest people that I have the priviledge of to call my friends.
It does not matter who writes the letters, there is always one in the family who is better at writing than the other.
So what is your point.