Friday, December 7, 2001 By Glenn Coin
As Patterson walks past a rusted van and toward the trailer, Pierce walks alongside while several nation police, including the cameraman, follow. Pierce SEGMENT, FROM PAGE C-1 holds a large black flashlight in his left hand. "Get your hands off me!" Patterson yells to Pierce as she hurries up the two wooden stairs to the small porch outside the door. Pierce appears to be holding the right sleeve of Patterson's black coat as they climb onto the small, wooden porch. Patterson stands with her back to the door. Pierce stands to her right, and nation police Officer Jeff Jost to her left. Jost holds Patterson's left elbow and tries to guide her off the porch. "Get off my porch," Patterson says. "You're not coming in my home. They do not have the right. They're not coming into my home. I don't care." Jost repeatedly grabs Patterson's elbow and pulls.
Patterson pulls back and tells him to stop touching her. Oneida city police Chief David Meeker, standing on the ground, tells Patterson that the tribal court order has been declared valid by the U.S. Attorney's Office. As they speak, Patterson's mother, Maisie Shenandoah, climbs to the porch. "We need five minutes to inspect the trailer here," Pierce says to Shenandoah. "Maisie, we've got a legal court order here." "This is no official paper from nobody," Patterson shouts, waving the order with her left hand. "This is Oneida land and I am an Oneida Indian, and I am not moving." "What's the problem?" Shenandoah asks. "There is no problem," Pierce replies. "We just want to perform a codes inspection." "This is my home, and I'm not letting you in it," Patterson says. "This is not a nation home or a nation building, at all." Shenandoah asks why her daughter hadn't been notified of the inspection. "We're notifying her right now," Pierce says.
In the video, Gene Rifenburg, a senior investigator for the nation, heads for the other door on the same side of the trailer. He carries a crowbar about 4 feet long. "No, you're not going in that door, neither," Patterson says. "You are not going in my home." "Put that crowbar down," shouts Patterson, who is being restrained by Pierce and Jost. "That is not necessary." "Danielle, either open the door, or I will pry the (rear) door off," Rifenburg says, standing in front of the porch. "Don't you dare," Patterson says. "Oh, I will," he says. "Listen. Will you listen for one minute?" Patterson says. "Listening's over," says Rifenburg, who is now off camera and heading for the rear door. The camera turns toward him as he climbs the rear stairs and begins working the edge of the crowbar against the lock. Patterson continues to tell Pierce to get off the front porch as Rifenburg tries to insert the tool between the door and the jamb. "Stop breaking my (expletive) door!" Patterson yells. "Get over here!" "You open that door, and I'll come over there," Rifenburg says. "Don't break my (expletive) door!" Patterson says. "I will," Rifenburg says. The camera cuts back to the crowded porch, where Patterson, Pierce, Shenandoah and Jost stand. Two other officers, including nation Sgt. Darryl Gillette, are on the top step. Pierce stands with his back to the door, feet spread apart. The other officer still holds Patterson's left arm. Patterson tells Pierce once again to get off the porch.
The camera cuts back to the rear door, where Rifenburg finally pops it open. He calls for the inspector, Mark Sternburg, who is the codes officer for the nation and also for the village of Hamilton. Sternburg climbs over a pile of clothes. "OK, we're in," Rifenburg says. A voice off camera says, "Remove her from the porch." The camera points to the front porch again, where Patterson is starting to struggle. Jost is holding her arms, while Pierce remains upright against the door. Patterson is leaning forward, trying to break free of Jost's grip. A plainclothes officer helps Shenandoah down the steps to get her out of the way. Patterson is still trying to get free, and now starts kicking. One of the kicks knocks Pierce's feet out, and he spins 90 degrees to the edge of the porch. Patterson kicks again and Pierce, losing his balance, jumps sideways off the porch. He lands upright in the grass, and has to jump over a blue plastic trash can as he struggles to retain his balance. As Patterson spins around, another plainclothes officer jumps backward off the porch to avoid her. Gillette now comes to the side of the porch, where Pierce has just jumped off. Gillette tries to grab Patterson's legs, but she kicks him in the chest. Jost is still holding Patterson's arms from behind, and Gillette finally gets hold of her legs after nearly being kicked in the face. A plainclothes officer gets back up on the porch and helps bring Patterson down the steps. "Don't pull my hair! Don't pull my hair!" Patterson says. "Are you going to come peacefully?" someone says. "Let her come down, then," says Shenandoah, her back to the camera.
Jost and Gillette bring Patterson down the steps, where she pulls away from Gillette and demands the return of her shoes, which have slipped off in the struggle. Someone brings her shoes, and she puts them on while standing up, Jost still holding her right arm. "I'm not fighting no more," she says. Then she asks: "Where's the Oneida city police?" She turns to Meeker, the chief, whose back is to the camera. Blood trickles from Patterson's nose and across her face. It's not clear from the video how she injured her nose. The blood is first visible when she comes down the steps. "I want to press charges for police brutality," she tells the chief. "Danielle, I told you," Meeker says. "The U.S. attorney said they have a right to go in." "Oh, he did?" Patterson says. "And what's his name?" "Pavone," Meeker replies, referring to U.S. Attorney Joseph A. Pavone. "They're going to do this one way or another. You might as well make it easy." A plainclothes officer walks into view and up to Patterson, who is being held now by Jost. "You're under arrest," the officer says. "For what reason?" Patterson asks. "Unruly conduct, resisting arrest - whatever it has to be," the officer says as he walks behind Patterson and begins to handcuff her. Several officers work to handcuff Patterson, who stands still now. "This is my house," she says again. "This is not nation housing. This is mine." Patterson begins to cry. "This is my home," she says. "This is not nation land. This is my house." As officers lead her away to an unmarked car for her arraignment in tribal court, Patterson asks someone off camera to contact her lawyer.
The camera then pans the trailer, showing at least two broken windows and another taped over with plastic and duct tape. Spliced into the end of the arrest video is a separate segment of the inspection itself. A nation officer, who identifies himself on the tape as Investigator Fish, follows the inspector, Mark Sternburg, as Sternburg walks through the trailer. This portion of the tape was shot with a different camera, during the time Patterson and police argued and struggled on the porch. Sternburg walks from room to room. In the back bedroom, Sternburg says the floor is bad. "The floor is rotted and has holes in it," he says. The camera follows Sternburg through the trailer. Counters are stacked with clothes, soda bottles and other items. As Sternburg enters the second bedroom, the video shows a door off its hinges and leaning against a wall in the hallway. Sternburg walks in and stops near the bunk beds. "I believe there is a hole in the floor in this bedroom," he says. "It's very spongy." Sternburg goes into the kitchen and squats in front of the sink. It's impossible to see what he is doing or what he sees. In the inspection report, Sternburg will write that the sink was not connected to the drain. Patterson said the nation police disconnected the pipes to make the trailer look worse, a charge the nation denied. As the tape ends, Sternburg and Fish go out the back door. The camera sweeps over a pile of clothes near the door, and Fish says: "You have to climb out the rear door over clothes to get out the rear door. That concludes the inspection."
© 2001 The Post-Standard. All Rights Reserved.
Contents
Last updated on April 22, 2005