Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca8-04-02173/USCOURTS-ca8-04-02173-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Fritz Arlo Looking Cloud
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

1

The Honorable Lawrence L. Piersol, Chief Judge, United States District Court

for the District of South Dakota. 

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT

__________

No. 04-2173

__________

United States of America, *

*

Plaintiff - Appellee, *

* Appeal from the United States

v. * District Court for the

* District of South Dakota.

Fritz Arlo Looking Cloud, *

*

Defendant - Appellant. *

___________

Submitted: January 10, 2005

Filed: August 19, 2005

___________

Before BYE, JOHN R. GIBSON, and GRUENDER, Circuit Judges.

___________

JOHN R. GIBSON, Circuit Judge.

Fritz Arlo Looking Cloud appeals his conviction for the first degree murder of

Anna Mae Aquash following a jury trial. His grounds for appeal are: (1) admission

of irrelevant, prejudicial evidence; (2) admission of hearsay and an improper limiting

instruction; (3) ineffective assistance of counsel; and (4) insufficient evidence to

support his conviction. The district court1

 sentenced him to life in prison. We affirm.

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 1 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257
2

This case is one of several cases to involve mid-1970s events at Pine Ridge

Indian Reservation. The occupation of the village of Wounded Knee in 1973

involved a stand off between a group of armed Native Americans and federal

authorities. See Bissonette v. Haig, 776 F.2d 1384, 1385 (8th Cir. 1985), cert.

granted, 479 U.S. 1083 (1987), aff'd for lack of quorum under 28 U.S.C. § 2109, 485

U.S. 264 (1988). After the occupation, residents of the area brought an action against

federal officials and military personnel, alleging that the seizure and confinement

violated their constitutional rights. Id. at 1386. Two years after the occupation,

American Indian Movement members camped out at the Pine Ridge Indian

Reservation to protect reservation traditionalists, who were in a violent political

struggle with Native Americans who supported the Bureau of Indians Affairs. Peltier

v. Booker, 348 F.3d 888, 889 (10th Cir. 2003), cert. denied, 541 U.S. 1003 (2004).

Leonard Peltier, an American Indian Movement leader, was convicted of killing two

FBI agents during his stay at the Reservation. Id. Peltier's conviction and sentence

of two consecutive life terms withstood several appeals and proceedings for postconviction relief. See United States v. Peltier, 585 F.2d 314 (8th Cir. 1978) (affirmed

1977 conviction); United States v. Peltier, 731 F.2d 550 (8th Cir. 1984) (remanded

for evidentiary hearing on Peltier's 1983 new trial motion on ground of newly

discovered evidence ); United States v. Peltier, 800 F.2d 772 (8th Cir. 1986)

(affirmed district court's denial of Peltier's new trial motion following evidentiary

hearing); Peltier v. Henman, 997 F.2d 461 (8th Cir. 1993) (affirmed denial of postconviction relief); Peltier v. Booker, 348 F.3d 888 (10th Cir. 2003) (affirmed denial

of habeas corpus relief seeking immediate parole), cert. denied, 541 U.S. 1003

(2004).

-2-

 Aquash's badly decomposed body was discovered in 1976, and police began

to suspect foul play after identifying her as having been involved with the American

Indian Movement.2

 Due to lack of cooperation, the investigation made little headway

until agents began talking to Looking Cloud in the mid-90s. Looking Cloud and

almost every other witness in the case were members of, and were actively involved

in, the American Indian Movement at the time of Aquash's death. The government's

theory at trial was that Looking Cloud and other American Indian Movement

members killed Aquash, who was also a member, because they suspected she was a

federal informant, working with the government. 

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 2 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257
3

John Graham was indicted along with Looking Cloud but has not been

extradited from Canada and, thus, has not yet been tried. 

-3-

When the rumor began to spread around the American Indian Movement that

Aquash was an informant, she fled Pierre to Denver. A few weeks later, Looking

Cloud, Theda Clark and John Graham (also called John Boy Patton)3

 received orders

from the American Indian Movement to bring Aquash back to South Dakota. They

tied her up and drove her to Rapid City to question her about being an informant.

Aquash was constantly guarded and her requests to be let free were refused. At some

point, Aquash realized that she was about to be killed. Looking Cloud, Clark, and

Graham met with other American Indian Movement members in Rapid City and

eventually the three drove Aquash to an area near Wanblee. Aquash begged to go

free, prayed, and cried. Looking Cloud and Graham marched Aquash up a hill and

Graham shot her at the top of a cliff. Her body was either thrown or it tumbled to the

bottom of that cliff. 

I.

Looking Cloud argues that the district court erred in admitting evidence about

the activities of the American Indian Movement because it was irrelevant to the

murder charge or, alternatively, because it was overly prejudicial. Looking Cloud

asserts that the government portrayed the American Indian Movement as a violent

organization so that the jury would associate violence with Looking Cloud, who was

a member. 

Federal Rule of Evidence 401 defines "relevant evidence" as "evidence having

any tendency to make the existence of any fact that is of consequence to the

determination of the action more probable or less probable than it would be without

the evidence." Relevant evidence is admissible but may be excluded under Rule 403

if "its probative value is substantially outweighed by the danger of unfair prejudice,

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 3 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257
-4-

confusion of the issues, or misleading the jury . . . ." Evidence is not unfairly

prejudicial because it tends to prove guilt, but because it tends to encourage the jury

to find guilt from improper reasoning. Whether there was unfair prejudice depends

on whether there was an "undue tendency to suggest decision on an improper basis."

United States v. Sills, 120 F.3d 917, 920 (8th Cir. 1997) (citations omitted).

Prejudicial evidence is not automatically excluded and we give great deference to the

district court's balancing of the probative value and prejudicial impact of the

evidence. United States v. Ruiz, 412 F.3d 871, 881 (8th Cir. 2005). We review the

district court's decision to admit evidence for abuse of discretion. Id. at 880.

Looking Cloud objected to some, but not all, of the American Indian Movement

evidence. To the extent he failed to object, our review is for plain error. See United

States v. Sharpfish, 408 F.3d 507, 511 (8th Cir. 2005). 

The government's theory of the case was that Aquash's murder was organized

and executed by Movement members. The government set out to prove that Looking

Cloud received orders from decision-makers within the Movement to kill Aquash

because she betrayed the Movement by becoming an informant. The government

offered two distinct types of evidence: (1) evidence that witnesses or the people

discussed by the witnesses were members of the American Indian Movement and

knew each other through that organization, and (2) evidence of the violent activities

in which the Movement was involved. 

The first type of evidence showed Looking Cloud's association with the

Movement and its members. This evidence is comparable to the admission of a

defendant's association with a group or gang, who engage in violent activities. We

have admitted evidence of a defendant's association with a group where the

association establishes motive or opportunity to commit the crime. See Sills, 120

F.3d at 920. Where a group plays a role in the crime the defendant is charged with,

evidence of the nature and extent of the defendant's association with that group may

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 4 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257
-5-

be necessary. See, e.g., United States v. Johnson, 28 F.3d 1487, 1497 (8th Cir. 1994).

However, a defendant cannot be convicted because of his association with a group.

United States v. Lemon, 239 F.3d 968, 971-72 (8th Cir. 2001) (affirming admission

of gang-related evidence because it did not become a "pervasive theme"); Johnson,

28 F.3d at 1497-98 (affirming admission of evidence that served to clarify

connections between the defendants but did not serve as a substitute for linking the

defendant to the crime). In Sills and Johnson, we affirmed the district court's

admission of gang-related evidence because although the evidence linked the

defendants to a gang, it fell far short of encouraging the jury to base its verdict on

guilt by association. Sills, 120 F.3d at 920; Johnson, 28 F.3d at 1497. 

 

The murder of Aquash could only be explained within the context of the

American Indian Movement and its activities. Aquash and Looking Cloud were both

members, as was virtually every person who came into contact with Aquash before

her death. Aquash was moved through a network of American Indian Movement

members from Denver to Rapid City to Rosebud before she was killed. The evidence

showed how the members' preoccupation with Aquash escalated until her death. The

government introduced evidence that influential members of the Movement had

concluded that Aquash was an informant, and that the Movement delegated the task

of killing her to Looking Cloud, Clark, and Graham. Evidence of how those who

surrounded Aquash in the last months of her life were intimately involved with the

Movement tended to make the government's theory--that the Movement orchestrated

Aquash's murder--more probable. Proof of Looking Cloud's involvement in the

Movement was crucial to explain why he would have killed Aquash. 

There was a low risk that, from evidence of mere membership in the

Movement, the jury would associate violent activity with Looking Cloud. The

evidence linked Looking Cloud to the American Indian Movement, but it did not

encourage the jury to find him guilty because of his association with the Movement.

 

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 5 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257
-6-

For the second type of evidence, Darlene Nichols testified as to several

incidents of violence involving the American Indian Movement. Three of these, the

riot in Custer involving several hundred people, the seventy-one day occupation of

Wounded Knee, and a shoot-out near her home which killed two FBI agents, were the

most violent events discussed and were also the least related to Aquash and Looking

Cloud. In other words, evidence of these three events is the least probative and the

most prejudicial.

Evidence of the activities engaged in by Movement members provided context

for the Movement and showed how loyal and dedicated its members were, and how

extensively involved they were in the Movement. The events mentioned by Nichols

depicted a violent conflict between the Movement and the federal government. This

conflict showed why the Movement would be enraged if one of its own members

turned against it to become a government informant. This background information

helped the jury understand why the Movement would go so far as to order the

execution of a suspected government informant. 

If any of the evidence of the violent acts involving the Movement was admitted

in error, that error was harmless. An error is harmless "if, after reviewing the entire

record, we determine that the substantial rights of the defendant were unaffected, and

that the error did not influence or had only a slight influence on the verdict." United

States v. Crenshaw, 359 F.3d 977, 1003-04 (8th Cir. 2004) (quoting United States v.

Carroll, 207 F.3d 465, 470 (8th Cir. 2000)). These events were mentioned in passing

by Nichols, and they did not become the focus of the trial. There was no in-depth

discussion of the degree of violence or injuries caused by the events. The information

was elicited in a matter-of-fact way and was not inflammatory. The jury would not

have been unduly influenced by the evidence. 

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 6 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257
4

After that initial limiting instruction, upon subsequent objections, the district

court would reiterate that the evidence was not admitted for the truth of the matter

asserted. 

-7-

We hold that the district court neither abused its discretion nor committed plain

error in admitting the evidence related to the American Indian Movement. 

II.

Looking Cloud's second evidentiary argument is that the district court erred in

admitting evidence that Aquash was a government informant because it was

inadmissible hearsay. The district court permitted several witnesses to testify that

people within the American Indian Movement had accused Aquash of being an

informant and that Aquash spoke of fearing for her life because of the accusations.

The government concedes that Looking Cloud objected to the admission of most of

the informant evidence and properly preserved those objections for appeal. 

The district court sustained Looking Cloud's hearsay objection in part and gave

the following limiting instruction to the jury:

The requested testimony is hearsay, but I am going to admit it for a

limited purpose only, this is a limiting instruction. It isn't admitted nor

received for the truth of the matter stated. In other words, whether the

rumor [that Aquash was an informant] is true or not. It is simply

received as to what the rumor was. So it is limited to what the rumor

was, it is not admitted for the truth of the statement as to whether the

rumor was true or not. So with that limiting instruction, which in part

grants the objection, but the objection beyond that is overruled.4

An out-of-court statement is not hearsay if it is not offered for the truth of the

matter asserted. See Fed. R. Evid. 801(c). 

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 7 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257
-8-

Evidence that Aquash was rumored to be an informant was probative of

Looking Cloud's motive to kill her. In United States v. Amahia, 825 F.2d 177 (8th

Cir. 1987), a husband was indicted for conspiracy to enter into a fraudulent marriage

in order to obtain an immigrant visa and permanent residency. We affirmed the

district court's decision to admit evidence of a conversation where someone told the

wife about the availability of cash for entering into bogus weddings with Nigerians.

Id. at 179. The conversation was not offered for the truth of the matter asserted–to

show that cash actually was available for entering into a fraudulent marriage–but to

explain why the wife decided to marry her husband. Id. at 181. The conversation

was admissible to "help the jury in understanding the context and circumstances"

relating to the marriage. Id. In United States v. Cline, 570 F.2d 731, 734 (8th Cir.

1978), we affirmed the district court's decision to permit a witness to testify about a

conversation between the defendant and the deceased victim that showed ill feelings

between the two. Hostility between the suspected murderer and the victim provided

a motive for the murder and helped the jury determine whether the murder was

premeditated. Id. 

Here, the evidence that Aquash was rumored to be an informant was not

offered for the truth of the matter asserted. It was not important for the jury to

determine whether Aquash was actually an informant. Rather, the rumor's value was

in helping the jury understand Looking Cloud's alleged motive for killing her. It only

mattered whether Looking Cloud had heard or believed that Aquash was an

informant, not whether she was an informant. The informant rumors were therefore

not hearsay and were relevant to Looking Cloud's guilt. The informant rumors helped

the jury understand the context and circumstances of the murder. 

In a related argument, Looking Cloud asserts that the district court erred by

giving an improper limiting instruction to the jury on the informant evidence. A party

cannot preserve a claim of instructional error for appellate review unless he makes

a sufficiently precise objection and also proposes an alternate instruction. Caviness

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 8 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257
-9-

v. Nucor-Yamato Steel Co., 105 F.3d 1216, 1220 (8th Cir. 1997). Looking Cloud

failed to offer a limiting instruction and we thus review for plain error. See id. 

The district court explained to the jury that the evidence was not admitted for

the truth of the matter stated. The court admitted the evidence to show "what the

rumor was" not "whether the rumor was true or not." We reject Looking Cloud's bare

allegation that this instruction was inadequate and unclear. We hold that the district

court's decision to admit the evidence of the rumor that Aquash was an informant was

not an abuse of discretion and the court's admission of the evidence subject to a

limiting instruction did not constitute plain error.

III. 

Looking Cloud alleges that he received ineffective assistance of counsel

because his attorney failed to (1) object to the admission of a videotaped interview

on the ground that it violated Looking Cloud's Sixth Amendment rights, (2) object to

inadmissible hearsay statements of Aquash and request a hearsay jury instruction, and

(3) object to leading questions.

Ineffective assistance of counsel claims nearly always require the development

of facts outside the record, which makes those claims generally inappropriate for

direct appeal and better raised in a habeas proceeding. See United States v. Santana,

150 F.3d 860, 863 (8th Cir. 1998). We will not consider ineffective assistance of

counsel claims on direct appeal except in "exceptional cases in which the district

court has developed a record on the ineffectiveness issue or where the result would

otherwise be a plain miscarriage of justice." Id.

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 9 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257
-10-

We decline to review Looking Cloud's claim because this is not such an

exceptional case. One basis for Looking Cloud's ineffective assistance claim is that

his attorney should have moved to suppress the police interview because Looking

Cloud was intoxicated and therefore could not knowingly and intelligently waive his

right to counsel. The only mention of alcohol in the record is in the video recording

of the police interview. In that video, an agent asks Looking Cloud whether he is

under the influence of any drugs or alcohol, to which Looking Cloud replies, "A little

bit of alcohol." There is no further development of the issue in the record and thus

no way for us to determine the merits of Looking Cloud's argument. We decline to

rule on Looking Cloud's ineffectiveness claims in this appeal, but he may raise them

in a proceeding brought under 28 U.S.C. § 2255.

IV.

Looking Cloud's final argument is that the evidence at trial was not sufficient

to support his conviction and the district court erred in rejecting his motion for

judgment of acquittal. The jury convicted Looking Cloud of first degree murder or

of aiding and abetting that murder under 18 U.S.C. §§ 1111 and 1153. The elements

Looking Cloud disputes are (1) that he killed or aided and abetted in the killing of

Aquash; (2) that he did so with malice aforethought; and (3) that the killing was

premeditated. 

We review the sufficiency of the evidence de novo and will reverse a

conviction only if, after viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the jury's

verdict and giving the government the benefit of all reasonable inferences that may

be drawn from the evidence, no construction of the evidence will support the jury's

verdict. See United States v. Simon, 376 F.3d 806, 808 (8th Cir. 2004). Either direct

or circumstantial evidence may provide a basis for conviction; adducing direct

evidence at trial is not a requirement. Id.

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 10 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257
5

Darlene Nichols testified that Leonard Crow Dog and Leonard Peltier thought

Aquash was an informant, and that Nichols, her daughter, and Dennis Banks, heard

Peltier say he thought Aquash was an informant. Mathalene White Bear and Troy

Lynn Yellow Wood testified that Aquash told them of the accusations. Angie Janis

testified that Thelma Rios said Aquash was an informant and that the rumor was

discussed at a meeting attended by Yellow Wood, John Graham, George Palfey,

Ernesto Vijil, and possibly Looking Cloud. Denise Pictou, Aquash's daughter,

testified that Looking Cloud told her and her sister about the rumor. Richard Two Elk

also testified that Looking Cloud discussed the allegations with him. Candy

Hamilton and Cleo Gates testified to hearing the rumor. Trudell testified that Aquash

and Looking Cloud told him of the accusations. 

-11-

The evidence adduced at trial was as follows. The testimony established that

nearly twenty members of the American Indian Movement suspected Aquash was an

informant or had at least heard the rumor.5

 Darlene Nichols, who joined the

Movement in 1972 and had been an active member, testified that several members,

one of whom had already threatened Aquash's life because he suspected she was an

informant, took Aquash away for weeks to "watch her." Nichols said that Aquash

was constantly watched, was not allowed to go anywhere alone, and was not

permitted to go home despite her requests to do so. Mathalene White Bear, another

former member who provided shelter to Aquash in 1975, testified that Aquash

believed her life was in danger as early as September of that year. 

In November 1975, Aquash left Pierre and went to Denver, where she stayed

in the home of a Movement member. Other Movement members frequently gathered

at this house. Several members held a meeting at the house in November 1975

because they had received a phone call saying that Aquash was an informant and

needed to be taken to Rapid City, South Dakota. The group decided Looking Cloud,

Clark, and Graham would take Aquash to Rapid City. Janis testified that those three

carried Aquash to the car against her will, crying; her wrists were bound and she was

tied to a board and unable to walk on her own. They put her in the back end of a

hatch-back Pinto and drove to Rapid City. After meeting with more American Indian

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 11 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257
-12-

Movement members at the Wounded Knee Legal Defense/Offense Committee house

in Rapid City, they drove Aquash to Rosebud. Yellow Wood said that Looking

Cloud stayed with Aquash in the car while Graham and Clark went into a house.

There, Aquash begged to be let go and told Looking Cloud that the others were inside

deciding her fate and were probably going to make him pull the trigger. John Trudell,

chairman of the American Indian Movement from 1973-1979, testified that Looking

Cloud, Graham, and Clark were not decision-makers for the American Indian

Movement, and that the group did not make but rather received orders to kill Aquash

before they left the house in Rosebud. The jury could reasonably infer from Looking

Cloud's participation in carrying Aquash out to the car, tied to a board, that he knew

they were going to kill her. In further support of that inference was evidence that

Aquash also knew in advance that she was going to be killed. Aquash mailed a ring

back to White Bear before she died; it was a signal the two friends had previously

arranged so White Bear would know something had happened to Aquash.

Trudell testified that Looking Cloud told him that when Graham and Clark

returned to the car for the last time, Aquash cried and begged them not to kill her.

They drove to an area near Wanblee and parked the car. Yellow Wood testified that

Looking Cloud told him that Aquash continued to cry, pray, and beg for her life as

they forced her out of the car and marched her up the hill to a cliff. Two Elk testified

that Looking Cloud told him he handed a gun to Graham and nodded at him. Aquash

knelt to the ground, possibly to pray, and Graham held the gun to the back of her head

and pulled the trigger. Afterwards, the three buried the gun under a bridge nearby.

From the testimony, the jury could reasonably infer that from the time the car

left the house in Rosebud, Looking Cloud understood that the plan was to kill

Aquash. Although Looking Cloud told others that Graham pulled the trigger, and the

government introduced no evidence to the contrary, the jury could at least reasonably

believe that Looking Cloud helped force Aquash out of the car and up the hill and

that he assisted in the murder by handing the gun to Graham to shoot and kill Aquash.

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 12 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257
-13-

This constitutes sufficient evidence to support the jury's finding that Looking Cloud

killed or aided and abetted in the killing of Aquash, with malice aforethought, and

that the killing was premeditated.

We affirm the district court's judgment of conviction.

______________________________

Appellate Case: 04-2173 Page: 13 Date Filed: 08/19/2005 Entry ID: 1942257