DeMarrias v. State of South Dakota

• Decision Date: 22 July 1963
• Docket Number: No. 17200.,17200.
• Citation: 319 F.2d 845
• Parties: LaVern DeMARRIAS, Appellant, v. STATE OF SOUTH DAKOTA, Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

319 F.2d 845 (1963)

LaVern DeMARRIAS, Appellant, v. STATE OF SOUTH DAKOTA, Appellee.

No. 17200.

United States Court of Appeals Eighth Circuit.

July 22, 1963.

L. R. Gustafson, Britton, S. D., for appellant.

Frank L. Farrar, Atty. Gen., Pierre, S. D., for appellee; Walter Weygint, Asst. Atty. Gen., Pierre, S. D., with him on the brief, together with Harold C. Doyle, U. S. Atty., Sioux Falls, S. D., and Parnell J. Donohue, Asst. U. S. Atty., Sioux Falls, S. D., amicus curiae.

Before VOGEL, VAN OOSTERHOUT and RIDGE, Circuit Judges.

VAN OOSTERHOUT, Circuit Judge.

This is an appeal by LaVern DeMarrias from final order of the district court denying him a writ of habeas corpus. Appellant was prosecuted and convicted in the courts of South Dakota on a charge of burglary committed within that state. His conviction was affirmed. State of South Dakota v. DeMarrias, S.D., 107 N.W.2d 255. Certiorari was denied. 368 U.S. 844, 82 S.Ct. 72, 7 L.Ed.2d 42. The sole issue raised in the state court appeal and here is whether the state court had jurisdiction to try and convict the appellant.

18 U.S.C.A. § 1153 provides that federal courts shall have exclusive jurisdiction over 10 major crimes committed by Indians in Indian country. Burglary, such as here charged, is included in the 10 major crimes. It is conceded that the appellant is an Indian and is a duly enrolled member of the Sisseton-Wahpeton-Sioux Indian Tribe which is based in the Lake Traverse Reservation in South Dakota. It is also undisputed that the crime was committed upon land which was included in the original Indian reservation created by treaty between the Indians and the Federal Government. The controverted issue is whether, in view of the subsequent developments hereinafter discussed, the place of the crime was within Indian country as such term is used in the federal statutes. 18 U.S.C.A. § 1151 provides:

"Except as otherwise provided in sections 1154 and 1156 of this title, the term `Indian country\', as used in this chapter, means (a) all land within the limits of any Indian reservation under the jurisdiction of the United States Government, notwithstanding the issuance of any patent, * * *."

The trial court held that the state court acted within its jurisdiction in trying and convicting the appellant of the burglary offense charged and denied the writ. The court rejected appellant's contention that under the circumstances of this case Indian country includes all lands within the original exterior boundaries of the reservation. The court, in a carefully considered opinion reported in 206 F.Supp. 549, cites and sets out portions of the agreement entered into in 1889 between the Government and the Tribe wherein it was agreed that more land was included in the reservation than needed and that for an agreed consideration the Tribe cede, sell, relinquish, and convey to the United States all right, title and interest in unallotted lands in the original reservation (26 Stat. 1035-1038), and that such agreement was ratified by Congress in 1891 (26 Stat. 1038-39), and that the lands thus acquired from the Indians were made available for settlement under the homestead and townsite laws, and by proclamation of the President such ceded lands were open for settlement (27 Stat. 1017). The land upon which the crime occurred was part of the land ceded by the Indians which was open for settlement and as to which patent issued to a Non-Indian. The trial court also points out that the Enabling Act for the creation of the State of South Dakota provides that Indian lands shall remain under the exclusive jurisdiction and control of the United States "until title thereto shall have been extinguished by the United States."

The trial court in its opinion has clearly demonstrated that the effect of the foregoing transactions was to restore the unallotted lands which the Indians ceded to the public domain and to remove such unallotted lands from the category of Indian country.

This same background material is relied upon and discussed in Application of DeMarrias, 77 S.D. 294, 91 N.W.2d 480, and is followed in State of South Dakota v. DeMarrias, S.D., 107 N.W.2d 255. In the second DeMarrias case, the Supreme Court of South Dakota states that the earlier DeMarrias case involved the same reservation, the same treaty, the same defendant and a similar crime, and poses the same question as the latter appeal. The court, in the second DeMarrias case, distinguishes Petition of High Pine, 78 S.D. 121, 99 N.W.2d 38, and Kills Plenty v....