FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE December 13, 2001 www.indiantrust.com INTERIOR, JUSTICE LAWYERS MASSAGED REPORTS TO JUDGE TO HIDE NON-COMPLIANCE ON INDIVIDUAL INDIAN TRUST Lamberth: "I needed to read that carefully to figure that out, didn't I?" WASHINGTON, D.C. - Interior and Justice Department attorneys pored over draft reports to a federal judge in an attempt to hide a decision by top Interior officials not to comply with his 1999 ruling ordering an historical accounting of billions of dollars in revenues from Indian-owned lands, a senior trust official testified today. The official, Thomas M. Thompson, substantiated conclusions by a court- appointed investigator that the reports over the past two years were evasive and misleading and were designed to cover up Interior's strategy of ignoring U.S. District Judge Royce C. Lamberth's order, while hoping that Lamberth's ruling would be overturned on appeal. The accuracy of the conclusions by Court Monitor Joseph S. Kieffer III is a central element of contempt charges against Interior Secretary Gale Norton and Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Neal McCaleb now being heard by Lamberth. Thompson's testimony revolved around Interior's legal strategy, in the wake of Lamberth's December 21, 1999 order, to make a strictly limited effort to comply with what the judge had ordered, including searching for missing Individual Indian Monies (IIM) trust documents only from 1994 forward, when Lamberth had ordered them to search for all missing documents from the trust's inception in the 19th century. A February 2000 report to the judge was evasive about the decision to restrict the search. "I needed to read that carefully to figure that out, didn't I?" Lamberth asked. "It took some reading, yes, sir," said Thompson. "I don't understand how I was supposed to understand from that language the dramatic decision the department had made," Lamberth said. "It's really a subterfuge," said the judge at another point. "The decision had been made and it was covered up with this language." "Somebody decided I was not going to be told that you weren't going to collect any information before 1994," Lamberth continued. Telling him honestly, he said, "would be so clearly contemptuous, nobody would pose it that way." Thompson also testified that although Lamberth had ordered Interior to conduct an historic accounting of "all funds" deposited in the trust since the 1880s, the department commenced planning for a simpler, cheaper statistical sampling process, even though Interior and Justice officials knew it would not comply with Lamberth's ruling. Thompson, who is principal deputy in the Office of the Special Trustee, testified that OST's "approach was to prepare for an accounting," but that that was "adamantly opposed" by the Interior Solicitor's Office. "The fact that I had ordered it was ignored?" said Lamberth. "It appears not to have been persuasive, your honor," Thompson replied. Thompson's testimony continues on Friday, December 14. #####