Litigation | Openings & Closings

MOWA Band of Choctaw Indians loses decision in casino lawsuit

Wednesday, April 1, 2015

Framon Weaver, the chief the MOWA Band of Choctaw Indians in Alabama. Photo from NMAI

The Indian Gaming Regulatory Act does not extend to non-federally recognized tribes, a judge in Alabama ruled, dealing a setback to the MOWA Band of Choctaw Indians.

The tribe opened the Choctaw Entertainment Center on its reservation in 2013. State authorities shut it down in November of that year, saying it was an illegal gambling operation.

Authorities brought forfeiture proceedings in state court to determine the fate of 50 machines that were seized during a raid. The tribe objected, saying the dispute belonged in federal court.

But Judge Callie V. S. Granade said the MOWA Choctaws can't claim any rights under IGRA. Congress intended the law to apply to federally-recognized tribes, she determined.

"The MOWA defendants point to no evidence of a congressional intent to completely preempt the field of regulating gaming by Indian tribes that have not attained federal recognition," Granade wrote in the nine-page ruling issued on Monday.

"This court is not inclined to expand the purview of the statute to include non-federally recognized tribes without explicit authority from Congress," Granade added, concluding that the case must return to state court.

The tribe asserted sovereign immunity from the state proceedings despite a lack of federal recognition. Choctaw ancestors signed the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek in 1830 but the document was not considered as evidence of federal court jurisdiction in the case.

Turtle Talk has posted documents from the case, Alabama v. 50 Serialized JLM Games.