To this day, no one, other than those who were present, really knows what actually took place on the rutted old road that leads to the Jumping Bull Compound. As Kevin Matthews, a history teacher at Northern Kentucky University put it in a 2001 guest editorial for the Cincinnati Post, "everything about this case is disputed."

Pine Ridge, South Dakota

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According to the FBI's version of events, as detailed in a report published on the Web page of its Minneapolis field office, some time before the end of June, Leonard Peltier, a member of both the Lakota and Ojibwa nations and a noted Indian activist, had turned up on Pine Ridge. Peltier had a reputation as an agitator and, according to his current lawyer, Barry Bachrach, had angered both government and tribal officials. The FBI contends "there is evidence that Peltier was the leader of a group of Indians who had committed burglaries on the reservation," including one break-in, the FBI alleges, in which a British-made .308 rifle was taken. That weapon, the agency later claimed, was fired against one of its agents. More to the point, the feds maintain, "Peltier was the subject of an outstanding federal warrant for unlawful flight to avoid prosecution." That warrant was issued, the feds claimed, "after Peltier fled Milwaukee to avoid apprehension and prosecution for the attempted murder of an off-duty police officer in that city."

308 rifle, British made

But the FBI has always insisted that it was not trying to arrest Peltier when two of its agents sped onto the reservation on the morning of June 26. As with virtually all elements of the Peltier case, the actual details of the event remain in dispute.

FBI agents Ron Williams & Jack Coler

The way the FBI describes the events, the night before, agents Ron Williams and Jack Coler had gone to the reservation in search of a young Indian named Jimmy Eagle who was wanted on charges of robbery. Though former FBI director Louis Freeh would later characterize Eagle as a potentially dangerous bank robber, Amnesty International, in its summary of the case, argued that Eagle was actually wanted for nothing more than the theft of a pair of used cowboy boots.

FBI Director, Louis Freeh

Peltier's supporters have long maintained that the warrant for Eagle's arrest was a ruse, that the agents were actually after Peltier and the other AIM members who had set up camp near the Jumping Bull Compound. They note that neither of the agents was even carrying a copy of the warrant for Eagle's arrest when they drove in separate cars onto the compound shortly before noon on June 26. They had been told, the FBI reported, that Eagle was driving a red pickup.

Amnesty International logo

The FBI contends that at about 11:50 a.m., other agents in the area overheard a radio transmission "where Agent Williams advised Agent Coler he had spotted a red and white vehicle and was going to stop it." None of the radio transmissions was recorded, and various agents have given various accounts of the description Williams radioed to Coler, but the FBI insists that "testimony presented at trial made it clear that there was only one vehicle operational in that area fitting that general description."

Joe Stuntz

Instead of a red pickup, however, the agents found themselves following a red and white Chevrolet Suburban. Inside it were three men: Joe Stuntz, Norman Charles, who had spoken to the agents the night before, and Leonard Peltier. The way the FBI describes the events, both Williams and Coler tailed the Suburban. When Williams' car got within 250 yards of the Suburban, the three men stopped. "In the next radio transmission overheard, which was only a few seconds later, Williams stated that the occupants had exited the vehicle and it appeared they were preparing to fire at the agents."

Ward Churchill

Then the shooting started. Peltier's supporters, among them controversial University of Colorado ethnic studies professor Ward Churchill, have long maintained that the Indians gathered at the Jumping Bull Compound believed they were, or were about to be, under attack and that they appeared to have believed that they were acting in self-defense. As Harbury put it, "Many non-Aim persons were present as well. A shoot out began between the two vehicles, trapping a family with small children in the crossfire. From throughout the ranch, people screamed that they were under attack, and many hurried to return fire."

Daniel Inouye

Even Judge Gerald Heaney of the federal appeals court in Duluth, Minn., writing in 1991 to US Senator Daniel Inouye, conceded that the agents and their superiors may have fatally miscalculated that day, and that, in part, may have contributed to the bloodshed. "The United States government over-reacted at Wounded Knee," Heaney wrote. "Instead of carefully considering the legitimate grievances of the Native Americans, the response was essentially a military one which culminated in a deadly firefight on June 26, 1975, between the Native Americans and the FBI agents and the United States marshals the United States government must share the responsibility with the Native Americans for the June 26 firefight. It was an intense one in which both government agents and Native Americans were killed. While the government's role in escalating the conflict into a firefight cannot serve as a legal justification for the killing of the FBI agents at short range, it can properly be considered a mitigating circumstance."

What's more, the supporters also believe that the deadly confrontation could have been avoided if Coler and Williams had appreciated the stiff resistance they would face and retreated, or at least sought a more defensible position. "What we couldn't understand was why them two men stayed right where they were, down in that field," Churchill quoted AIM activist Bob Robideau as saying. "They couldn't have picked a worse place in the first place. The least they could have done was backed them cars down into the woods that would've been easy. Or at least run for the corrals, where there was a little cover. They didn't even try to take cover; the most they did was kneel down alongside their car. The rest of the time they just stood there, right out in the open."

The FBI reports that "in the last radio transmission monitored, Williams was giving directions to other agents on how to get to his and Coler's location. Williams warned Agent J. Gary Adams that if he did not get there quickly, they were dead men. Williams announced that he and Coler had been hit and gunfire could be heard in the background."

But as Adams reached the area, he and other agents and officers also came under fire and were pinned down. In fact, the FBI reported that it wasn't until 4:25 p.m. more than four-and-half hours after the confrontation began that agents were able to find the bodies of Coler and Williams. They also found the body of Joe Stuntz. He had been shot once on the head. His killing, Harbury writes, was never investigated.

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