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5th Navajo tribal member comes forward with allegations
By Elizabeth Hardin-Burrola
Gallup Independent correspondent
religion@gallupindependent.com
Jan. 28, 2017
GALLUP – A fifth individual from the Navajo Nation has filed a lawsuit against the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, alleging she was sexually abused as a minor while enrolled in the church’s Indian Student Placement Program.
In the lawsuit filed Wednesday in Window Rock District Court, the plaintiff, identified only by the initials I.R., alleged she was subjected to “ongoing and systematic sexual abuse” by her Mormon foster father while attending high school in Spanish Fork, Utah.
I.R. said she was baptized into the LDS Church in 1968 when she was 15 years old so she could participate in the placement program, which took her from her home in Fort Defiance, Arizona, and placed her with a Mormon foster family in Spanish Fork for her eighth-grade school year. I.R. said in the lawsuit that the sexual molestation began when she was in the ninth grade and continued through the 11th grade. She also said that on several occasions she asked her placement program caseworker to move her to another home, but he did not do so.
In March 1971, I.R. said she returned to her home on the Navajo Nation after she contacted family members and asked them to pick her up in Utah. I.R. said that her LDS caseworker contacted her at least two times at Window Rock High School and attempted to convince her to return to her Mormon foster home, which she refused to do.
Legal battles
The lawsuit was filed by attorney William Keeler, of Gallup. Keeler, along with attorneys Craig Vernon, of Coeur D’Alene, Idaho, and Patrick Noaker, of Minneapolis, also represents four other Navajo tribal members who said they were sexually abused as children while enrolled in the Indian Student Placement Program, also known as the Lamanite Placement Program.
Adult siblings — a brother and sister — filed the first lawsuit in March. Within a couple of months, two more individuals — a woman from the Navajo Nation and a tribal member living in Utah — filed additional lawsuits.
The first case has experienced a number of legal battles. In May, attorneys for the LDS Church filed an amended motion for a temporary restraining order in U.S. District Court in Utah, arguing that the lawsuits exceeded the “well-established jurisdictional limits of tribal courts” because the claims involve the actions of non-tribal members off the reservation.
In response, the Navajo Nation filed motions with the court asking to intervene in the case and requesting the court to dismiss the church’s complaint for failure to exhaust tribal court remedies. In November, U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby ruled the LDS Church “must first exhaust their remedies” in the Navajo Nation courts before seeking redress in the federal courts.
Although LDS Church attorneys asserted none of the actionable conduct related to the alleged sex abuse took place on tribal land, Shelby noted that attorneys representing the Navajo tribal members “have alleged that actionable conduct underlying at least some of their claims occurred on the Navajo Reservation,” including the alleged failure by church officials to report the abuse or disclose the abuse to Navajo parents.
In the lawsuit filed Wednesday, I.R. said her placement program caseworker contacted her at least twice on the Navajo Nation and attempted to get her to agree to move back to her Mormon foster home in Utah.
In an interview Friday, Keeler said the caseworker’s actions on the Navajo Nation are important for a court to consider.
“We just believe it creates ties between the church and the Navajo Nation,” he said.
Attempts to subpoena
Another legal dispute has centered on Keeler’s and Vernon’s attempts to subpoena Thomas S. Monson, the president of the LDS Church. Monson, 89, was ordained an LDS apostle in 1963 and served as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles before becoming church president in 2008.
According to news reports in Utah, Salt Lake City attorney David J. Jordan, an attorney for the LDS Church, has filed motions to quash the subpoena in Salt Lake City’s 3rd District Court, in spite of Shelby sending the case back to the Navajo Nation. In a filing, Jordan said Monson does not have “any unique personal knowledge” regarding the facts at issue in the litigation.
Jordan was contacted for comment, but he did not respond as of Friday afternoon.
Keeler, however, said he and Vernon were working on “subpoena domestication” efforts to move the deposition of Monson forward. A hearing on the matter is scheduled in the Utah court Feb. 21, he said.
Keeler said Monson, as a member of the LDS Church’s Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, would have received a number of reports through the years about the Indian Student Placement Program.
“He happens to be the only one alive,” Keeler said of the LDS apostles who served during the 1960s and 1970s.
When asked about other potential lawsuits against the LDS Church, Keeler said additional Native American people have come forward with allegations that they were sexually abused in the Indian Student Placement Program. As a result, he said, more lawsuits may be filed in the future.
A spokeswoman for the LDS Church declined to comment about this latest lawsuit, the ongoing litigation or the efforts to subpoena Monson. In an email Friday, Karlie Guymon, a media relations associate for the church, re-emailed statements issued by church spokesman Eric Hawkins in June.
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