Standing Rock Six Years Later: Militarized police, Cover-ups and the Fight for Justice

By Brenda Norrell
Censored News

"They zip-tied us. They put us on the ground, hauled us in buses to the basement of the Morton County Jail, and imprisoned us in dog cages after they wrote numbers on our arms like the Jews going to gas chambers."

"We were kept in dog cages on the bare cement floor." Those are the words of Casey Camp Horinek, Ponca Councilwoman, who was in ceremony when dragged out and arrested. These are here words before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in Jamaica.

The day of the attack by militarized police was Oct. 27, 2016.

Obama refused to stop the police violence

Before the brutal attack on Standing Rock Water Protectors on Oct. 27, 2016, Cheyenne River Lakota Chairman Harold Frazier met with Obama in Los Angeles and urged Obama to take action before it was too late.

Obama did not respond with help and instead went to a golf game and an expensive dinner fundraiser. It is one of our most censored news articles. Another censored news fact: Before Obama visited Standing Rock in June of 2014, the permits for the Dakota Access Pipeline were already approved in the spring of 2014, according to internal federal documents.

Two years later, the protection of the water began, and the militarized police fired rubber bullets, tear gas, pepper spray, and bean bags at close range at Water Protectors, resulting in critical injuries.

During the attacks by militarized police in 2016, women were strip-searched, and elderly Native women were locked in wire cages in a jail basement with numbers written on their arms as was done by the Nazis. Native elders were denied their medicines.

Obama gave false hope in press statements that Dakota Access Pipeline would be stopped. While Water Protectors were being brutalized the last week of October 2016, Obama responded to a question from the press and said, "We're going to let it play out for a few more weeks."

The abuse was accelerated by the media, including Billings media, which bolstered the comments of the Morton County Sheriff.

The Intercept: TigerSwan and FBI operative exposed

The role of TigerSwan mercenaries, and FBI undercover operative Heath Harmon, a tribal member of Three Affiliated Tribes in North Dakota, were later exposed by The Intercept media. It was Harmon's pistol, which he left in his coat pocket, that resulted in the arrest and imprisonment of Red Fawn.

Reporter Allen Brown exposed most of the facts known so far about TigerSwan and Harmon.

Instead of winning awards for investigative journalism, Brown was recently laid off by The Intercept. Brown's layoff happened as The Intercept was in court seeking the release of TigerSwan's documents at Standing Rock.

Paiute Shoshone journalist Myron Dewey, killed on an isolated road in Nevada last year, documented with video and drones the private security hired by Dakota Access Pipeline. Myron could have testified in the ongoing court cases based on excessive force by law enforcement resulting in critical injuries.

The internal documents of TigerSwan mercenaries, hired by the Dakota Access Pipeline, and directing law enforcement, are due to be released. Earlier, North Dakota's regulatory board found TigerSwan operated without a license in North Dakota and the court ruled thousands of documents are public records.

The militarized vehicles and equipment, and sheriffs deputies present, were the result of lobbying by the National Sheriffs Association. Its president stood to gain at the end of the Dakota Access Pipeline on the Louisiana coast.

Read more: Full article at Censored News:

https://bsnorrell.blogspot.com/2022/10/standing-rock-six-years-later.html

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