Leonard Peltier (born September 12, 1944) is an American Indian activist and mainstay member of the American Indian Movement who, following a controversial trial, was convicted of aiding and abetting murder and has been imprisoned since 1977. He was sentenced to two consecutive terms of life imprisonment for aiding and abetting resulting in the death of two Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents in a June 26, 1975 shooting on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota.[1][2][3]
In his 1999 memoir Prison Writings: My Life Is My Sun Dance, Peltier admitted to participating in the shootout but said he did not kill the FBI agents.[4][5] Human rights watchdogs, such as Amnesty International, and political figures including Nelson Mandela, Mother Teresa, and the 14th Dalai Lama, have campaigned for clemency for Peltier in recent decades.[6][7][8]
At the time of the shootout, Peltier was an active member of the American Indian Movement (AIM), an indigenous rights advocacy group that worked to combat the racism and police brutality experienced by American Indians.[9] Peltier ran for President of the United States in 2004, winning the nomination of the Peace and Freedom Party, and receiving 27,607 votes, limited to the ballot in California. He ran as Vice President of the United States in 2020, on a ticket with Gloria LaRiva as the presidential candidate, on tickets for other left parties as well as on the ballot of the Peace and Freedom Party. Leonard withdrew from those tickets on August 1, 2020 for health reasons.[10][11][12]
Peltier is incarcerated at the United States Penitentiary, Coleman in Florida.[13] Peltier became eligible for parole in 1993.[14][15] On January 18, 2017, it was announced that President Barack Obama denied Peltier's application for clemency.[16] He is of Lakota, Dakota and French descent. He is an enrolled member of the Turtle Mountain Chippewa.
