The Ute Indian Tribe has discovered the power of
money.
Some 10 months after the tribe’s business
committee launched a boycott of Roosevelt, Utah, businesses there
continue to feel its sting. The boycott centers on a decades-old
dispute over who should prosecute tribal members charged with
misdemeanors in the town of Roosevelt, pop. 5,000 – the city or the
Ute Indian Tribe.
“I’ve been
in business for seven years,” says Evan Gentile, “and it’s never
been tougher.” Sales at his quick lube shop are down 9 percent.
Uinta Basin Tractor Inc. lost a $150,000 contract. “Now that
they’ve boycotted us,” says Davy Evans, the parts manager, “I can’t
even sell them a filter.”
Antagonism
intensified in April when the Roosevelt City Council voted 3-2 not
to hand over any jurisdiction to the tribe.
That
followed a U.S. Supreme Court decision giving Roosevelt the legal
right to prosecute Ute tribal members charged with misdemeanors.
The tribe wants this eastern Utah town to waive that right and let
the tribe prosecute such cases under its own law-and-order code.
The code places more emphasis on community service for minor
offenses and less on fines, since many of the tribe’s members are
poor.
If a Roosevelt resident is arrested on
tribal land, the individual is turned over to the appropriate
county for prosecution. “We have the common courtesy to give you
back to your people and say, “You take care of your problem,”
“””says Kirby Arrive, a member of the Ute business committee.
“All we are asking is that common courtesy in return, and I don’t
think that is beyond reason.”
” Guy
Boulton
The writer works for
the Salt Lake Tribune.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Utes fight for right to prosecute.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
