In the Spirit of Crazy Horse by Peter Matthiessen (1995, Paperback, Reprint)

Leonard Peltier was innocent of the charges brought against him after the FBI attacked homes on Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota in 1975. Those present when the incident with the FBI happened know this. Someone had to be the sacrifice, the feds wanted a head, & Leonard was it.
This book is so meticulously researched it's chilling. I am no fan of Matthiesen (his name is misspelled by ebay), but the man did a great job tracking down witnesses & gathering documents & information to present to the reader. What 'hangs' those who manipulated this situation most is THEIR OWN WORDS!
The FBI, especially Special Agent David Price, & past Governor William Janklow all lost their extensive legal attempts to keep this book from being published & to hide this information from us. Janklow has long been an Indian opponent, & continues to be, as far as I can ascertain. It hasn't mattered that witnesses for the prosecution recanted testimony, or later reported being railroaded & threatened into giving FALSE testimony! It hasn't mattered that nothing adds up to Peltier being the one to shoot anybody that day. Many witnesses attest to his leaving the scene to guide women & children out of harm's way as bullets flew around them.
It may be difficult if not impossible for non-Indians to see or accept the extent that the prosecutors went to to get a conviction in this case, or the dark & dirty methods often employed as revealed by Matthiesen, but it happens to this day, in many cases, always has.
Although Peltier SHOULD have been paroled by now, each time he comes up for that the FBI & other agencies launch extensive campaigns to keep him in prison.

Matthiesen also offers a history of the Lakota, the social conditions such as income, education, & corruption on the Pine Ridge Reservation, how the feds despised the American Indian Movement on Pine Ridge(see also BURY MY HEART AT WOUNDED KNEE for more on that), & how the BIA appointees' extreme & unorthodox tactics in administering the reservation dovetailed nicely with FBI surveillance and subversion of suspected subversive groups, including AIM, and the paranoia generated within the FBI & state government set the stage for the firefight & subsequent so-called trial.

Far from being a defense of Peltier, this is a factual account of one of the most horrific MISTRIALS of "justice" ever conducted.

Did Matthiesen's efforts change anything? Has ANYONE'S to date?
Also read Vine Deloria Jr's book 'American Indians, American Justice' for more on how the system works for Indian People.

I highly recommend Matthiesen's book to all, especially to NON-Indians.

This book should really be in the Fictional catagory. The author who is best friends with the Indians involved in the shooting of the FBI agents & the ones that killed Anna Mae as a 'suspected' informant, provides no documentation, zero evidence other than his personal opinion. From a convicted murderer he gets his 'facts'. It is sad so many First Nation people have been fooled by these kinds of books. Not one thought is given to the people suffering on the reservations, just the AIM leaders who were never voted in by them. Many whites have been fooled also by the misguided sympathy for the First Nation people by these books. The sad truth is clearly & thoroughly documented in the book "American Indian Mafia" written by FBI agents who were there and had access to all the records. Records are even photocopied in the book but the the conspiracy theory AIM members call them all lies. Based on what? All you hear is silence.

A 30 year conspiracy thats still going on under how many Presidents? Come on. Give me a break! In the end you have to side with the evidence and not opinion & even Peter Mathesson says at the end of the book he is not sure if his best friend Leonard Peltier killed the 2 agents or not after hundreds of pages defending him.