Calflooking v. Tulalip Tribes

13 Am. Tribal Law 491
CourtTulalip Court of Appeals
DecidedJuly 26, 2016
DocketNo. TUL-CV-AP-2015-0406
StatusPublished

This text of 13 Am. Tribal Law 491 (Calflooking v. Tulalip Tribes) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Tulalip Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Calflooking v. Tulalip Tribes, 13 Am. Tribal Law 491 (tulalipctapp 2016).

Opinion

[492]*492OPINION

DANIEL A. RAAS, Chief Justice.

Michael Calflooking (Appellant) appeals his conviction for violating an Order of Exclusion issued against him by the Tulal-ip Tribal Court. He lists three grounds for his appeal:

(1) He was never served with the Exclusion Order barring him from entering the Tulalip Reservation, had no knowledge of its contents and therefore could not “knowingly or purposefully” have violated the order. Thus the Tribes failed to meet its burden of proof of an element of the crime of Violation of Exclusion Order. TTC 3.30.250(1)1
(2) A Declaration of Service by Officer Hagmann, a tribal police officer who did not testify, was improperly admitted by the Tribal Court. Without the service of pleadings averred in this declaration, the Tribes could not meet its burden of proof of all of the elements of the crime.
(3) The Tribal Court improperly ruled that the issue of whether Appellant was a member of a federally recognized Tribe of American Indians was not an element of the crime that the Tribes needed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt, but instead held that tribal membership was an affirmative defense which the Appellant failed to raise or prove. If proof of tribal membership is an element of the crime that the Tribes were required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt, the Tribes failed to prove this element.

FACTS

On April 12, 2013, the Tribes filed a Petition for Exclusion of Appellant from the Tulalip Reservation. The Petition was authorized by Resolution 2013-110 of the Tulalip Board of Directors (the governing body of the Tulalip Tribes). A Notice of Hearing accompanied the Petition, setting the Hearing on the Petition for May 22, 2013. Officer Hagmann declared that he served Appellant with the Petition, the Notice of Hearing, and a Motion for a Continuance on May 22, 2013, while Appellant was in the Snohomish County jail.2 The Motion for Continuance is not in the record, nor is a Notice of Hearing setting a new hearing date after May 22, 2013. The parties agree that at some point an Exclusion Order barring Appellant from the restricted lands of the Tulalip Reservation was issued. Neither that Order nor a sworn statement that Appellant was served with that Order at any time prior to June 30, 2016 are in the record.

About two years later, on June 15, 2015, Appellant was arrested on the Tulalip Reservation pursuant to a Washington State [493]*493Department of Corrections warrant. The testimony at trial shows that neither Appellant, the arresting officers nor any of the police personnel consulted by the arresting officers had any knowledge of the Exclusion Order at the time of arrest. Appellant was served with the Exclusion Order in open court on June 30, 2015. Appellant was convicted of the crime of Violation of Exclusion Order, TTC 3.30.250(1) and subsequently appealed.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

A Trial Court’s finding of fact and inferences drawn from findings of fact are to be sustained unless clearly erroneous. TTC 2.20.090(1) and (2). This standard applies to the Trial Court’s finding that Appellant had sufficient knowledge of the contents of the Exclusion Order to convict him of a “knowingly and purposefully” violation of that Order.

A Trial Court’s conclusion of law is reviewed de novo, or without any deference to the Trial Court holding. TTC 2.20.090(4). This standard applies to the Trial Court’s admission of Officer Hag-mann’s Declaration and to the ruling that Appellant’s membership in a federally recognized Tribe of American Indians is an affirmative defense which Appellant must plead and prove by a preponderance of the evidence rather than, as Appellant claims, one of the elements of jurisdiction that the Tribes must plead and prove beyond a reasonable doubt.

DISCUSSION

Appellant asserts that he was not served with the Order of Exclusion until June 30, 2015. Thus he argues that he had no knowledge of the substance of the Order and could not form the required intent to “knowingly or purposefully” violate it before that date. Without this knowledge he maintains that his due process right to know in advance what conduct is prohibited was violated and his conviction must be overturned.3

TTC 2.40, Exclusion, is the Tulalip ordinance governing exclusion of persons from the Tulalip Reservation.4 TTC 2.40.010(3) states that one of the purposes of the Exclusion Ordinance is to “provide orderly and fair procedures for the exercise of the Tribes’ exclusion power, consistent with the Indian Civil Rights Act of 1968, 25 U.S.C. 1301 et seq.” TTC 2.40.050 sets out the grounds for exclusion. TTC 2.40.060 sets out the required contents of a Petition for Exclusion. TTC 2.40.070 sets out what must be included in a Notice of the Petition for Exclusion and how service on the person who is sought to be excluded must be made. The Notice must include a statement that the hearing may result in a temporary or permanent order of exclusion. TTC 2.40.070(2)(e) (emphasis added). The Notice must be personally [494]*494served on the defendant pursuant to TTC 2.40.070(3).

The record reflects that a Petition, Notice and Motion for Continuance were properly served on the Appellant (subject to a ruling on Appellant’s second assignment of error). The parties agree that Appellant appeared in Court on May 22, 2013, the date required by the Notice, and that on that day the Trial Court granted the Motion for Continuance. And the parties agree that the Appellant did not appear at the subsequent hearing at which a valid Order of Exclusion was issued. It is unclear whether a Proposed Order of Exclusion was included in the pleadings served on Appellant, although the Tribes maintain that it was. However, the Petition for Exclusion, the Notice, the Motion for Continuance, the Proposed Order of Exclusion—assuming that one was included with the Petition and Notice—and the Order of Continuance—again assuming one was issued—are not in the record before us. The Trial Court recording of the hearing at which the Order of Exclusion was considered and entered is also not in the record before us. Nor does the record contain the Exclusion Order as entered by the Tribal Court, which the parties agree was served upon Appellant on June 30,2015.

An order of exclusion must be served on the person excluded. TTC 2.40.070(10).5 The record before us contains no evidence that the Exclusion Order was served on the Appellant before his arrest on June 15, 2015. Appellant was convicted of violating TTC 3.30.250(1). Part of the prosecution’s burden of proof under this ordinance is to introduce evidence that proves beyond a reasonable doubt that a defendant “knowingly or purposefully” entered onto the restricted lands of the Tulalip Reservation in violation of an Exclusion Order. The Appellant cannot knowingly or purposefully enter the Tulalip Reservation in violation of an exclusion order which has not been properly served upon him.6

The Trial Court accepted the Tribes’ argument that Appellant was on constructive notice of the contents of the Exclusion Order because he had been served with the Petition for an Order of Exclusion and the Notice of Hearing.

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Bluebook (online)
13 Am. Tribal Law 491, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/calflooking-v-tulalip-tribes-tulalipctapp-2016.