Reznet

To'hajiilee Boys Basketball Team Knows the Pain of Being Singled Out

By Dalton Walker

The pain and friction of being singled out because of who you are as a person is an experience most Natives can relate to. It's a disturbing daily battle with no end in sight.

Steps are being taken. We will soon have our first non-white president in Barack Obama.

Yet, most of America is running in place. Just look at New Mexico, a state full of people of color.

In March 2006, the To'hajiilee Community School boys basketball team, while playing in a tournament in Des Moines, N.M., was accused of stealing — not by the victims but by the police. To'hajiilee is a chapter of the Navajo Nation and a Native high school.

The tournament was hosted by Des Moines High School. Springer High School and Temple Baptist High School also competed. During the tournament, the coach of Temple Baptist told police that some items were stolen from the locker room. All four teams shared the locker room.

According to a press release, the police forced the To'hajiilee team to line up on the basketball court, in front of the crowd. Then the team was ordered to go into the locker room where police only search their belongings. Once finished, the police searched the team bus, which was locked when the alleged theft occurred.

Police authorities did not request or receive consent from the To'hajiilee team to search any of the team's belongings, including the bus, according to the press release. The search took place despite statements by coaches that a search was not necessary.

They were the only team searched. They were the only team embarrassed and singled out. For what? In my mind, for being Native.

On behalf of the To'hajiilee school, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a civil-rights lawsuit against the state Department of Public Safety in federal court last year. The nine basketball players testified.

The lawsuit was settled for $95,000, the Associated Press reported last week. A small victory but, nevertheless, a victory.

"Police officials do not have a blank check to conduct searches at their will," the press release quoted a spokesperson for the ACLU in New Mexico as saying. "Allowing police to conduct these kinds of searches of students with no consent or probably cause turns our schoolhouses into jailhouses."

It's tough being Native. We battle for a better life everyday. It hurts knowing some people have the power to accuse without probable cause only because you look different.

Dalton Walker, Red Lake Anishinabe, is a reporter at the Argus Leader newspaper in Sioux Falls, S.D. Walker is a graduate of the University of Nebraska in Lincoln and the American Indian Journalism Institute. A longtime reznet staff writer and a Chips Quinn Scholar, Walker had reporting internships at the Star Tribune in Minneapolis and The New York Times.

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