Attorney: Melody
McCoy, Dawn Baum
Case Update
NARF represents the Turtle Mountain Chippewa, Chippewa Cree, White Earth Band of Minnesota Chippewa, and Little Shell Chippewa Tribes in this case against the Federal government for misaccounting and mismanagement of their tribal trust fund, the Pembina Judgment Fund, since the inception of the fund in 1964. In 2006 the Tribes defeated the United States' motion to have the case dismissed.
In 2007, the Court, with the agreement of the parties, ordered the first two temporal phases (1964 - September 1992) of the transactional claims and investment claims to be resolved through alternative dispute resolution (ADR) proceedings before a Settlement Judge of the Court. In 2008, the third temporal phase (October 1992 - December 1995) was assigned to ADR proceedings. Formal discovery is being conducted on the fourth temporal phase (January 1996 - Present) of the Tribes' claims.
During the Presidential campaign last year, candidate Barack Obama "committed to resolving equitably "all Indian trust fund mismanagement litigation against the federal government if he was elected President. We are now hoping that President Obama will live up to this campaign promise and begin settlement negotiations in this case and the other Indian trust fund mismanagement cases soon. The new Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar, has already said publicly that settlement of these cases is one of his priorities. We are optimistic that settlement negotiations will begin soon.
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