Help ICT make strides in 2024. Our goal is to raise $150,000 by the end of the year with generous contributions from funding partners and collaborators like you. We’re thankful for your support, and we’re thriving because of it. DONATE TODAY!
Amelia Schafer
ICT + Rapid City Journal
A federal court case was dismissed after the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribal Court reversed its exclusion, or banishment, of two current Dupree School District employees.
In early November, Dupree Elementary School teacher Sarah Shaff and district superintendent Keith Fodness launched a federal lawsuit challenging their banishment from the Cheyenne River Reservation in South Dakota.
The U.S. South Dakota District Court held a hearing November 15, anticipating on setting a date for the plaintiff’s Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus and request for Declaratory and Injunctive Relief.
Instead, shortly before that hearing, representatives from the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribal Court presented the district court with a reversal of its initial banishment that sparked the lawsuit.
After this news was presented, the Shaff et. al lawsuit was considered moot and dismissed with prejudice, meaning the plaintiffs can’t file another lawsuit pertaining to the issue.
(Related: Former school employees sue tribal officials over banishment)
Cheyenne River Sioux Tribal officials did not respond to a request for comment on why Shaff and Fodness’s banishment was reversed. It is unclear if the tribal council was involved in the decision.
The Dupree School District is not affiliated with the tribe, but sits within the formal boundaries of the Cheyenne River Reservation and serves a student body of mostly tribal members. Not all of Dupree is tribal land, and the exact plot of land the school sits on is not tribal land.
Per the Bureau of Indian Affairs, tribes possess the right to banish any individual Native or non-Native who violates the tribe’s terms of agreement allowing for their presence on tribal land.
Court documents indicate that Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Chief Justice Brenda Claymore, who was named in the Shaff and Fodness lawsuit, signed off on the banishment’s dismissal.
Both individuals had been formally banished on August 18 after Shaff was accused of child abuse and Fodness of failure to report abuse. Another employee, Cindy Lindskow, was also banished but that order was dismissed in September as she is a private property owner on the reservation.
Shaff was accused of allegedly hitting, grabbing and berating students of color while also making them “fetch snacks” like dogs. The Cheyenne River Sioux Tribal Police turned over their findings to the Pierre FBI office, as they cannot charge any non-tribal member with a crime. It is unclear if any of the educators have been charged.
In late August, the two families who accused Shaff of abuse filed a Voluntary Dismissal of their civil complaint in tribal court.
On November 30, a Dupree School District administrator told ICT News and the Rapid City Journal that all three – Shaff, Fodness and Lindskow – are still employed by the Dupree School District. None of them were ever technically removed from the district.
The family whose children allegedly were abused by Shaff stated in court documents that they filed a complaint with the South Dakota Board of Education. The Board of Education has not taken any action.
This story is co-published by the Rapid City Journal and ICT, a news partnership that covers Indigenous communities in the South Dakota area.
Our stories are worth telling. Our stories are worth sharing. Our stories are worth your support. Contribute $5 or $10 today to help ICT carry out its critical mission. Sign up for ICT’s free newsletter.