D.Q. Pow Wow and Community Meeting April 6, 2008 10am to 6pm

To: Honorable Sen. Rep. Dale Kildee, MI. Ross Swimmer, B.I.A.; Joe Garcia, President N.C.A.I.;
Juana Magel, N.C.A.I., Executive Board, Member; Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown, Jr., Attorney General, State of California

From: Indigenous Nations Network,

Press contact: William Underbaggage (408)679-8598, willychili [at] hotmail.com
Mazatzin (510)406-3067 zemazatzin [at] hotmail.com

Re: Immediate intervention to hold our Pow Wow and community meeting as scheduled April 6, 2008

We, the Indigenous community of California, request your immediate attention and wise counsel to an atrocity which has been committed against our most sacred and prized relations.

They dragged our grandmothers off to jail shackled…they yelled and terrorized and forced our young mothers to run for their live with their babes in arms…they threatened to take away our children from their mothers…they tore our young men from the womb of their mother earth, OUR SACRED sweat lodge… they forced our people to kneel on the ground after they had been shackled…

This is not a story from the wild, wild west of 1849, when the madness of the gold rush triggered a “search and destroy of indian people ”and a stealing of their land but also the stated government policy of “the only good indian is a dead indian”… this is the reality of the wild, wild west of March 31st of 2008, and the new gold rush for Indian Casino, land and money.

On March 31, 2008, many students along with their family and community gathered at D. Q. University, the only tribal college in California, to commemorate the birthday of Cesar E. Chavez, a beloved indigenous leader of peace, which is a state holiday. Part of the commemoration was to include a sweat lodge ceremony conducted by our elder, who has been pouring water in the sacred lodge here at D. Q. U. for the better part of 35 years, along with being its spiritual advisor. The gathering was also for the planning of an upcoming Pow Wow and a community meeting scheduled for April 6, 2008. The meeting was called to elect a new board of directors for D. Q. U., as due to the incompetence and illegal activities of the present board the College had lost its accreditation and was threatened with closure. The students refused to let D. Q. U. die and have been living there on campus and continuing their education with community teachers and traditional elders. The board was aware that they lived at the dormitories and were holding classes and had appointed Chris Yazzie (one of the arrestees and student body treasurer student board member) as the care taker of the campus. By the way, three board members were present and accompanied the police during this assault.

D. Q. U., located in Yolo County, California (6 miles nw of Davis University), is an Indigenous University and international center dedicated to the cause of world peace. The D. stands for Deganawdah who is known to have planted the tree of the great peace with the hope that all nations of the earth could take shelter there. The Q. stands for Ketzalkoatl which represents the precious knowledge of my precious twin, of my precious self… thus, D. Q. U. is founded on these principles.

Without prior warning nor announcement at approximately 9:40 am on Monday, March 31, 2008, the campus of D. Q. U. was assaulted with extremely lethal action by many police agencies with local, state and apparently federal involvement, totaling more than 50 officers and an enormous contingency of vehicles for transport and assault and two airplanes. The result was what turned out to be over 48 hours of terrorizing, persecution and detention and arrests of innocent students and community which included using battering rams to break doors down and ransacking the students’ dormitories. It also includes a predawn assault on April 2, 2008, and arresting students with guns and tasers drawn from around the fire of the sweat lodge at which the students have been keeping the sacred fire lit in their prayers for a peaceful resolution to this madness. In short, this event was a most horrifying violation of civil and human religious rights on “U. S.”soil, and although three other students had been arrested the previous month and were awaiting trial in Yolo County. Thanks to corporate media to most this was a non-event, however, view indybay.org for news on D. Q. U.

There is more information and plenty of photos and documented video footage to confirm the above statements. What is most needed right now is for yourself and other elected officials to step up and call for an immediate investigation into these actions and what lead to these actions. We further need your help to have this and the previous court case moved to Sacramento from Yolo County because of it’s racist attitude against indigenous people as exemplified by its representative police agencies that participated in the assault at D. Q. U. Yolo County Supervisor Dwayne Chamberlain is directly related to this case in that he is leasing and benefiting D. Q. land and this would add another conflict of interest.

Lastly, we need your immediate intervention to have our Pow Wow and community meeting as scheduled April 6, 2008, that has been planned and many people are expected to attend that have not heard what happened at D. Q. U. and will be walking into another armed assault without notice nor provocation, but for the fact of being indigenous, as the board has already threatened to arrest those coming to the Pow Wow.

Thank you Sir, in advance for your attention, please contact us at your earliest convenience, at the numbers above as you see this matter is an URGENT call for help, on this day as we commemorate the late Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination 40 years ago, also due to racist intolerance.

Signed by: Concerned Community Members, D. Q. U. ASB, teachers, advisers and supporters.


ALSO: AN IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT FROM THE STUDENTS OF D. Q.

SUNDAY'S POW WOW AT DQ UNIVERSITY IS STILL ON.

The DQ University Board of Trustees is trying to prevent the pow wow: and the Azteka Corn-planting Ceremony, and the People's Meeting to choose a new leadership for DQ University from happening that day, but the board is not going to succeed in silencing the voice of The People.