Not Guilty Plea in American Indian Killing

By CARSON WALKER – Dec 7, 2007

John Graham Photo by Carson Walker © 2007

John Graham arrives Friday, Dec. 7, 2007, at the federal courthouse in Rapid City, S.D. Four years after his arrest for the 1975 killing of a fellow American Indian Movement activist, Graham pleaded not guilty at his first court appearance Friday in U.S. District Court, a day after his last attempt at a Canadian appeal failed. He was extradited from Vancouver, British Columbia, to stand trial for the 1975 slaying of Anna Mae Pictou Aquash on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. (AP Photo/Carson

Anna Mae Aquash Photo Courtesy of Family © Family Photo

American Indian Movement activist Anna Mae Pictou-Aquash is shown in this undated file photo provided by her family. John Graham, charged with killing Pictou-Aquash in 1975, should learn Thursday, Dec. 6, 2007 if he has one more chance to appeal. (AP Photo/Courtesy of the family, File)

RAPID CITY, S.D. (AP) — A day after his extradition to the U.S., a Canadian man pleaded not guilty Friday to killing an American Indian Movement activist in 1975.

John Graham, a former AIM member, was charged with the first-degree murder of Anna Mae Pictou Aquash on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. Her body was found in February 1976 north of Wanblee with a gunshot wound to the head.

Magistrate Veronica Duffy ordered Graham to be held in the Pennington County Jail. No trial date was set. If convicted, Graham would face a mandatory life prison sentence.

Graham had been in custody in Vancouver, British Columbia, since June. He was escorted across the border Thursday, placed in U.S. Marshals Service custody, U.S. Attorney Marty Jackley said.

The Supreme Court of Canada refused Thursday to review his case.

Graham, 52, listened intently during the short hearing, nodded several times that he understood the proceedings and asked for only one point of clarification. Lawyer John Murphy was appointed to represent Graham.

One of Graham's daughters, Naneek Graham, told The Associated Press that his family was upset because they didn't get to see him before he was transferred. She said she now plans to help him prove his innocence.

"He wants be able to tell his side. He's been silent for all these years, these four years he's been under house arrest and in jail," she said.

"He said, 'The sooner I go down, the sooner I come back.' He's ready to get this going."

The American Indian Movement is an activist group that has protested the federal government's treatment of Indians and has demanded that the government honor its treaties with tribes.

The group occupied Wounded Knee on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation during a 71-day standoff in 1973 that included an exchange of gunfire with federal agents who surrounded the village. Aquash, a member of Mi'kmaq Tribe of Nova Scotia, was there.

American prosecutors said some of the AIM leaders ordered Aquash's killing late in 1975 because they suspected she was a government informant. Those leaders have denied the accusation and blamed the government for her death.

Federal authorities also denied any involvement.

The other man charged with killing Aquash, Fritz Arlo Looking Cloud, received a mandatory life sentence in 2004 after a federal jury in Rapid City convicted him. Witnesses at Looking Cloud's trial testified that Graham shot Aquash as she begged for her life.

Graham has denied it, though he acknowledged being in the car with her when she was taken from Denver to the Pine Ridge reservation.