Posted on 09/17/2002 9:23:30 AM PDT by NormsRevenge
WASHINGTON (AP) - A federal judge Tuesday held Interior Secretary Gale Norton in contempt for failing to heed his order to fix oversight problems with a trust handling hundreds of millions of dollars in royalties from Indian land.
U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth called the department's handling of the Indian money and the action of government attorneys in the case disgraceful, noting that he has the authority to take management of the funds away from the department.
Norton is the third Cabinet officer that Lamberth has held in contempt over the trust fund. Former President Clinton ( news - web sites)'s treasury secretary, Robert Rubin, and interior secretary, Bruce Babbitt, also were held in contempt on the case.
In December the judge shut down most of the Interior Department's Internet connections because he said the agency could not ensure hackers wouldn't break in and steal money.
The government has acknowledged major problems with the trust fund. The Interior Department has spent more than $600 million since 1996 to comply with instructions from both Congress and Lamberth, but accounting problems persist.
Norton inherited many of the problems with the trust fund. During a 29-day trial that ended in late February, she asked Lamberth for more time to make fixes. Lamberth was unmoved. On several occasions during the trial and since it concluded, he scolded Interior officials for foot-dragging and failure to comply with his orders.
In a 267-page opinion, the judge said the Interior Department not only failed to comply with his orders but also had lied to him about its progress in repairing the trust.
"The agency has indisputably proven to the court, Congress, and the individual Indian beneficiaries that it is either unwilling or unable to administer competently the (Indian) trust," Lamberth wrote.
"Worse yet, the department has now undeniably shown that it can no longer be trusted to state accurately the status of its trust reform efforts. In short, there is no longer any doubt that the secretary of Interior has been and continues to be an unfit trustee-delegate for the United States."
The trust, which now handles funds for about 300,000 American Indians, began in 1887 when Congress took 90 million acres from Indian tribes and gave the land to white homesteaders.
The Indians were left with allotments ranging from 40 acres to 320 acres, with the Interior Department assigned to manage grazing, timber and oil and gas drilling on the land, and ensure Indians received royalties for those activities.
For more than a century, an untold amount of money meant for some of the nation's poorest residents was lost, stolen or never collected. Indians sued in 1996, claiming the mismanagement cost them between $10 billion and $40 billion.
Lamberth ordered the department in 1999 to fix the system and piece together what the Indians are owed. He also found Babbitt and Rubin in contempt and ordered the government to pay $600,000 of the plaintiffs' attorneys fees for failing to turn over documents in the case.
In the latest ruling, Lamberth ordered the Interior Department to pay the attorneys' fees for the group of Indians who sued the department in 1996. Dennis Gingold, the plaintiff's attorney, said those fees would be in the millions of dollars.
Lamberth also said that he has the authority to strip the department of its oversight of the Indian royalties and appoint a trust expert outside the department to mange the money. The judge asked the plaintiffs to propose a new management structure.
Norton's own efforts to overahaul the management of the trust funds stalled last week when a task force of tribal leaders refused to back down on a demand that a panel outside the Interior Department, and including Indian members, supervise the department's management of the money.
So, what's the problem and why can't they fix it? What is this agency, the US Postal Service?! (/sarcasm)
This Reagan appointed judge still has my support as long as he doesn't support the spread of Indian Casinos into rural residential areas of CA. All these bureaucratic bung-holes need to be publically horse-whipped till they can no longer deposit those huge and steady federal paychecks without actually fixing the messes they make.
Why is America and it's people so patient with these parasites?
Behold The Man!
It is interesting what an utter failure the DOI is. All it does is suck money and create huge messes.
FYI. Kemosabe is a word made up by Hollywood in the early and beginning days of cowboy and Indian movies.
Federal judge’s ties to Islamic radical to be exposed
By Rick Wiles
American Freedom News
Copyright June 6, 2002
American Freedom News has learned that Attorney General John Ashcroft has been told that a sitting federal judge has close ties to Islamic radicals. He is suspected of being the same federal judge who refused to authorize over 20 FBI wiretaps on al-Qaeda suspects before September 11.
Judge Royce Lamberth is the chief judge in the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court (FISA) that meets weekly in the Justice Department to consider requests from federal agents for wiretaps of terrorist and espionage suspects. The secretive court was established in 1978 under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Judge Lamberth presides over the secret court that has authorized over 7,500 wiretaps.
Barbara Honegger, a senior analyst in the Defense Department, made the accusation to an FBI agent that Judge Lamberth’s relationship with Islamic radicals is suspicious. Honegger is a former member of the Reagan administration who held several sensitive positions.
According to intelligence reporter Martin Dillon, Honegger wrote a blistering memo to Attorney General John Ashcroft demanding that Judge Lamberth be investigated. Dillon reported that Honegger’s memo to Ashcroft states:
“It is absolutely critical that Congress obtain the list of the names of the up to 20 suspected Al Qaeda and other Islamic extremist operatives whose wiretaps were shut down or refused by Judge Royce Lambert and the FISA Court and match them with the names of the 20 9/11 hijackers, as well as with the names of all post 9/11 detainees held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba and elsewhere,”
When questioned by intel reporter Martin Dillon, Honegger told him:
“In the mid 1980s, an Iranian fluent in Farsi, Arabic, Urdu, Russian, and a number of other languages was in frequent contact by telephone with someone he described as `my good buddy Royce, an important judge in Washington, who got me into this country.’ Further questioning of this individual, who also claimed to be a mullah able to perform Islamic marriages and funerals, led to me being told that the last name of the Washington judge was Lamberth.
Honegger said she sent an “Extreme Alert” memo to Ashcroft on September 19, 2001, insisting that Judge Lamberth be investigated. The memo also went to Thomas Picard, the FBI agent in charge of the September 11 investigation. Her memo informed Ashcroft and Picard that Judge Lamberth “may have himself been acting with and on behalf of Islamic extremists.”
She said an FBI agent Sean Moore questioned her on April 4, 2002. Honegger also told Martin that both the House and Senate intelligence oversight committees are aware of her accusations.
According to Martin’s report, Honegger told him:
“Given this context, it is critical to the 9-11 Congressional investigation that, prior to 9-11, this same Chief FISA Court Judge Royce Lamberth shut down "up to 20" FISA wiretaps of Al Qaeda-related suspects linked to the near-simultaneous -- "twin" -- 1998 Africa U.S. embassy bombings. These 20 may well be, or significantly overlap with, the 20 9-11 hijackers -- 19 plus suspected "20th hijacker," Zacarias Moussaoui.
“It is therefore absolutely critical that Congress obtain the list of names of all of the "up to 20" suspected Al Qaeda and other Islamic extremist operatives whose wiretaps were shut down or refused by Judge Lamberth and the FISA Court, and match them with the names of the 20 9-11 hijackers, as well as with the names of all post 9-11 detainees held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and elsewhere.”
Of course, it has nothing to do with the Dept. of Interior bungling this case left and right.
"In 1999, Lamberth held Babbitt and Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin in contempt and fined them $600,000 for failing to turn over documents in the 5-year-old class-action lawsuit brought by Indian landowners. "
"Any fines imposed against Norton would be paid by the department, as were those imposed against Babbitt and Rubin. "
It seems that the government is perpetuating an accountability problem. Babbit and Rubin left office without paying a dime, doing any time, or being fired, as they deserved. Our taxes paid a $600,000 bill for contempt of court charges while simultaneously paying their salaries. While Judge Lamberth may appear frustrated, it has so far taken him six years and two administrations to still get nowhere, the Indians no answers, and the Interior wanting more money to "fix" a problem. While Lamberth appears angry, his job is still not done. Meanwhile, Babbit and Rubin left their offices and were rewarded with corporate or institutional positions based on their performance on the job while working for the Clinton Administration.
The government wants private sector CEOs and the likes to be accountable, but negates being responsible or accountable for itself. As long as ANY administration continues to foot contempt bills, and attorney fees for defendents who are deliberately being strung out by the courts, Indian Trust money will continue to be "lost, misappropriated, stolen or never collected," and the government will continue to acknowledge these facts for the next hundred years - in the courts - paid for by the taxpayers - long after Judge Lamberth, and the Indians who filed this case are gone.
Afterall, the Department of Interior is a government agency. Its funds are infinite in that it is funded by our tax dollars. As it stands now, the Department of Interior can't account for the agency's handling of $500 million a year in royalties and payouts, but the Department (govenment) via court (government) order pays $600,000 contempt fees and multi-million dollar annual defendant attorney fees, and continues to get departmental funding for an accounting program that hasn't worked in six years. I am sure everyone but the American Taxpayers and Indians who were, and are still, being robbed are quite comfortable with the status quo.
I don't think we are disagreeing with each other.
And when they do, they can't blame the government anymore for the accounting goofs.
It is way bigger than accounting goofs. What has already been admitted to is that the government has had no accounting system at all to be able to tell how much gas they have pumped, and to who they owe money. All parties know the Indians have been underpaid, since the 1970s, and the estimates of what is owed is in the billions.
Another thing is, I'm wondering if someone somewhere isn't trying to 'set up' Mrs. Norton?
No, she is simply acting in the exact same way that Babbit did. This is why I say that something is very wrong here. When Babbit did this, we could say this was part of the general Clinton corruption. But now that Norton had the chance to obey the courts and make a good faith effort, she chose the exact same tactic that Babbit used. Why? The only reasonable thing I can think of is that their internal estimates of what they owe are far higher than the Indian's estimates, so much so that the official government policy, no matter what administration, has become to lie to everyone , take their lumps in the courts, but refuse to pay.
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