Letter: Article about Mashpee Wampanoag employee misleading

Monday, January 10, 2011  

"Your Jan. 5 article "Tribe leader was arrested on drug charge" is considered by many of our tribal members, and those with decades of experience working in Indian issues nationally, regionally and locally, to be misleading to the public eye.

Ronda Jones-Hughes was a tribal employee. She was hired as the director of Indian Child Welfare within our Mashpee Wampanoag sovereign nation. She was not "a tribal leader."

To assist you, and your readers' education, by way of a hypothetical comparison, please consider it equivalent to a director level employee of the state Department of Public Health being let go by the state because the state had realized that this employee had previously been arrested on a drug charge; it would be equally as misleading for you to headline an article on that topic "State leader of Massachusetts arrested on drug charge.""

Get the Story:
Joan Tavares Avant: Arrested tribe member was employee, not 'leader' (The Cape Cod Times 1/9)

Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe fires ICWA director after drug charge (1/5)