Encyclopedia of the Great Plains

INCIDENT AT OGLALA

Incident at Oglala DVD Cover

Incident at Oglala is a 1992 documentary detailing the June 26, 1975, slayings of FBI special agents Jack Coler and Ronald Williams in the Jumping Bull compound near Oglala, South Dakota, and the subsequent conviction of Leonard Peltier for the crime. Although James Eagle, Dino Butler, Bob Robideau, and Peltier were charged with the shootings, Peltier was the only one convicted. Directed by Michael Apted and produced and narrated by Robert Redford, the film provides substantial background on the period of high tension on the Pine Ridge Reservation immediately following Wounded Knee II. The film clearly suggests the unscrupulous lengths to which the FBI and government prosecutors went in order to get a conviction. Peltier, who had fled to Canada, was extradited based on sworn affidavits that government prosecutors later admitted to be coerced fabrications.

Besides giving a feel for the conditions on Pine Ridge and an account of the incident, the film includes interviews and statements with key players and witnesses, including Peltier, American Indian Movement members Dennis Banks and Russell Means, William Kunstler, who served as attorney for Butler and appellant attorney for Peltier, and Myrtle Poor Bear, who claims she was coerced into changing her affidavit in order to extradite Peltier. Two assistant U.S. attorneys and one U.S. attorney speak for the government, but no FBI agents speak due to Bureau policy.

The Peltier case is ongoing. Peltier has become a celebrated example of someone considered by many to be a political prisoner. The incidents surrounding the story were also loosely used in Apted's theatrical film Thunderheart (1992).

See also PROTEST AND DISSENT: American Indian Movement.

Larry J. Zimmerman University of Iowa

Messerschmidt, Jim. The Trial of Leonard Peltier. Boston: South End Press, 1983.