By Staff Reporter
SALAMANCA — The Seneca Nation of Indians has barred every Level 3 registered sex offender from its territories, and it’s backing the ban with penalties that reach into members’ annuity checks and non-Native residents’ leases.
The Seneca Nation Council approved the resolution at a special session on Sept. 29 at the Seneca Allegany Administration Building. The Nation published the full text in the Oct. 16 issue of its official newsletter. Councillor Tina Abrams made the motion, and Councillor Odie Porter seconded it. The newsletter records the vote as “all in favor.”
What the resolution does
The resolution “prohibits all Level 3 registered sex offenders from entering or being present on any Seneca Nation Territory.” Level 3 is the highest risk level on New York’s registry. The Council wrote that such offenders “are determined to have a high risk of repeat offense and pose a threat to public safety,” and that the risk “is unacceptable and Council is compelled to take action.”
“Sexual offenses destroy our people and our communities,” the resolution says, “and the general public, especially our children and elders, must be protected from the perpetrators of such heinous and despicable crimes.”
There is one exception. An enrolled Seneca member who is a Level 3 offender may go to a Seneca Nation Health Center for federally funded health care, but only after sending a written request to the Marshals’ Department and the President’s Office at least 24 hours in advance and getting written approval. Marshals must escort the person the whole time. A request form is posted on the Marshals’ page of the Nation’s website.
The penalties
Under the resolution, any Level 3 offender found on Seneca land without permission “shall be considered to be a threat to public safety.” The Seneca Nation Marshals are to remove the person, “continue to remove them should they return,” and contact outside law enforcement to coordinate arrest and prosecution for trespassing.
For enrolled members, the cost is financial as well. A member who violates the ban faces forfeiture of “all annuity payments, elder benefits, disability benefits, and any other direct health and welfare payments” for one to five years, as set by the Nation’s Peacemakers Court, plus fines of $500 to $5,000 per violation.
The ban also reaches people who help an offender stay. Anyone who knowingly harbors a Level 3 offender can be charged in Peacemakers Court with aiding and abetting, with the same fines and possible loss of annuity payments. Anyone holding a lease on Seneca land who knowingly lets an offender stay on the leased property can be charged with breaching the lease, “with potential penalties including lease termination.”
That last clause could matter well beyond the Nation’s own members. The City of Salamanca sits almost entirely on leased land within the Allegany Territory.
Leaning on a state law
The resolution declares any non-member Level 3 offender who enters Seneca territory “an Intruder” for the purpose of asking a county district attorney to remove that person under state law, including Section 8 of New York’s Indian Law.
That law says a county district attorney, on the written application of a person designated by the Nation, “shall make complaint of any intrusions on such lands, and cause the intruders to be removed.” A county judge then decides whether the person is an intruder and can issue a warrant to the sheriff. The same law says a person is not considered to have entered Native land when “temporarily and continuously passing through such lands on highways, roads, trails, or other thoroughfares,” which would cover travel on Interstate 86 and other roads that cross the territories.
In practice, the ban will depend on the district attorneys and sheriffs of the counties where the Nation’s territories lie, including Cattaraugus, Erie and Chautauqua. New York holds criminal jurisdiction on Seneca land under a 1948 federal law.
Part of a broader push
The resolution fits a theme Nation President J.C. Seneca has pressed repeatedly: that state law enforcement on Seneca land has failed the Seneca people. In a message published in the same newsletter, Mr. Seneca praised U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand’s introduction of the Seneca Nation Law Enforcement Efficiency Act, which the Chronicle reported on Saturday.
“The lack of clear and effective law enforcement and criminal jurisdiction on our lands has created an environment where drug dealers, drug traffickers and other criminals have thrived at the expense of the safety of the Seneca people,” Mr. Seneca wrote in his Oct. 16 message.
The Nation has used exclusion before, but one person at a time. In 2023, then-President Rickey Armstrong Sr. signed an executive order banning Edward Kindt, convicted in the 1999 murder of Penny Brown of Salamanca, from all Seneca territories for one year as he was set to be paroled. “We do not believe that this individual should be allowed to re-enter the same community that was traumatized by his heinous actions,” Mr. Armstrong said at the time. “We will always act in the interest of our people’s safety.”
The new resolution is different in scale. It applies to an entire class of people, set by a state registry, rather than to one named person.
Open questions
Several things aren’t yet public. The Nation hasn’t said how many Level 3 offenders live on or regularly travel to its territories, or how the Marshals will identify them. The resolution says the Council may later define a Level 3 offender by law; until then, the term covers anyone listed as Level 3 “on any state or federal sex offender registry.” And the request form on the Marshals’ page cites a different council resolution number, S-04-14-26-21, which suggests some version of the escort process existed before the September vote.
Clear answers would help everyone who lives near the line. The Nation could publish written enforcement procedures for the Marshals, and the county district attorneys could say publicly whether they will act on the Nation’s intruder complaints. The Nation could also set out how a lessee who learns that a tenant or relative is a Level 3 offender should report it before facing a breach-of-lease charge.
The Buffalo Chronicle has asked the Nation’s Clerk’s Office for a certified copy of the resolution and the earlier resolution cited on the form. Any response will be added to this story.
Featured photo: A sign marking the entrance to Seneca Nation territory. Photo by Andre Carrotflower via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0. Cropped.
Leave a Reply