A view of the Osage Nation in Oklahoma. Photo from Facebook
The Interior Department owes a historical accounting to Osage Nation royalty owners, a federal judge ruled. The tribe received $380 million to resolve trust mismanagement claims against the federal government. But since the individual owners of the Osage mineral estate weren't a part of that case, they aren't bound by the settlement, Judge Gregory Frizzell ruled on December 30, 2015. “This is the first time in a century the United States has been ordered to account to the members of the Osage tribe,” attorney Jason Aamodt told The Pawhuska Journal-Capital. In 1906, Congress created the Osage mineral estate and divided it into 2,229 shares, which are also known as headrights. The shares represented the number of tribal members are the time of the law. Frizzell ordered the accounting to go back to 2002 rather than 1906, which he said would be too costly and take too much time. He said the accounting must include a description of every receipt and distribution, the source of the receipt, the identity of the beneficiary and other key information. Turtle Talk has posted documents from the case, Fletcher v. United States Get the Story:
Fletcher case plaintiffs due federal accounting (The Pawhuska Journal-Capital 1/13)
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