{"id":4471,"date":"2020-11-12T07:46:40","date_gmt":"2020-11-12T13:46:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.indianz.com\/News\/?p=4471"},"modified":"2020-11-12T07:53:37","modified_gmt":"2020-11-12T13:53:37","slug":"cronkite-news-farm-on-navajo-nation-under-investigation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/indianz.com\/News\/2020\/11\/12\/cronkite-news-farm-on-navajo-nation-under-investigation\/","title":{"rendered":"Cronkite News: Farm on Navajo Nation under investigation"},"content":{"rendered":"\"navajo\r\n
Navajo Nation President Jonathan Nez, Attorney General Doreen N. McPaul, and Navajo Nation Environmental Protection Agency Executive Director Oliver B. Whaley are seen meeting with Navajo farmers in and near Shiprock, New Mexico, on September 3, 2020. Photo: Navajo Nation\r\nOffice of the President and Vice President<\/figcaption>\r\n
Navajo hemp investigation expands to federal marijuana, labor probe<\/div>\r\n
Thursday, November 12, 2020<\/div>\r\n
By Calah Schlabach<\/div>\r\n
Cronkite News<\/DIV>\r\n
cronkitenews.azpbs.org<\/A><\/DIV>\r\n

<\/P>\r\nWASHINGTON – A Navajo Nation probe of a controversial, Navajo-owned hemp operation has turned into a federal investigation into reports of marijuana production, interstate drug trafficking and violations of labor and child labor laws.

<\/p>\r\nThe FBI said Monday it had executed search warrants “in the area of Shiprock” in an operation that included nine federal agencies as well as state, tribal and local agencies from at least three states. It released few other details.

<\/p>\r\nBut the Navajo Nation Department of Justice said the search warrants targeted “suspected illegal marijuana farming” at the Navajo Gold hemp farming operation run by Dineh Benally, former president of the nation’s San Juan River Farm Board.\r\n

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The Navajo Police Department is informing the public that a multiagency operation is underway in Shiprock, N.M. At this time, we stress that there is no threat in the community and we ask the public to refrain from interfering with police activity. More info will be provided.<\/p>\n\t\t<\/a>\n\t<\/div>\n\t

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<\/P>\r\n“Dineh Benally and his investors sought to take advantage of what they believed to be a jurisdictional gap on the Navajo Nation that would allow them to operate outside the law,” Navajo Nation President Jonathan Nez said \r\nin a statement<\/a>\r\nTuesday.\r\n

<\/p>\r\n“They did not count on the diligence or effectiveness of the Navajo Nation Department of Justice to be able to enforce our own laws through our own courts,” Nez’s statement said.

<\/p>\r\nBenally started his hemp operation last year and it now includes over 1,000 greenhouses and spans more than 400 acres in the Four Corners area, according to the Navajo Justice Department. The land is leased from Navajo farmers who formerly used it to raise corn.

<\/p>\r\n\r\nBenally appeared to ramp up operations on his farms after the COVID-19 pandemic hit, according to reporting by \r\nSearchlight New Mexico,<\/a>\r\nexploiting Chinese workers from California, many of whom said they lost their jobs because of the pandemic.\r\n

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<\/p>\r\nThese reports led Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-New Mexico, to \r\nask the U.S. Attorney<\/a>\r\nfor New Mexico to look into “disturbing reports of human trafficking and child labor” on the farms, including “children as young as 10 … reportedly among the vulnerable labor pool, working in hazardous conditions with reports of numerous Navajo Nation Environmental Protection Agency violations.”\r\n

<\/p>\r\n\r\nBenally’s business stirred up strong feelings in Shiprock, where neighbors protested his operation for much of the summer, according to ongoing reporting by \r\nthe Navajo Times.<\/a>\r\nNeighbors told the Times that Benally\u2019s operation was illegal, that he was bringing in workers from off the reservation despite the COVID-19 lockdown and they criticized the Navajo Nation for not moving more quickly to investigate Benally.\r\n

<\/p>\r\n\r\nIn June, the \r\nNavajo Nation sued<\/a>\r\nBenally and his two companies, Native American Agriculture Co. and Navajo Gold Co. After a September hearing and “overwhelming testimony from community members and Navajo Nation officials,” the Navajo Nation’s Shiprock District Court granted a motion for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction halting Benally’s operations.\r\n

<\/p>\r\nAccording to documents in that suit, the Navajo Nation does not allow cultivation of cannabis with THC levels above 0.3% and it does not allow hemp production – with the exception of one pilot project – because it has yet to create a regulatory system for the product.

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<\/p>\r\nBenally’s attorney could not be reached for comment Tuesday. But in published reports, Benally maintained that his hemp operation is legal, producing only low-THC, over-the-counter products. He claimed he had authority to issue hemp permits as president of the Navajo Nation\u2019s San Juan River Farm Board – a job he lost last week to Beatrice Redfeather-Benally, an outspoken critic.

<\/p>\r\n\r\nBenally’s business partner, Irving Lin, said in an \r\nOctober affidavit<\/a>\r\nthat he “came to understand that the promises and representations made \u2026 to get me to invest in his operation were not true.”\r\n

<\/p>\r\n“I have come to realize that the ‘hemp’ permits for which I paid Dineh Benally were in fact complete fabrications as Benally has zero authority to issue any permits on behalf of the Navajo Nation or even the San Juan River Farm Board,” said Lin, a Los Angeles-based real estate agent and investor in Benally\u2019s farm operation.

<\/p>\r\nAfter it won the temporary restraining order, Navajo officials gained access to Benally’s farms and confirmed some of the neighbor’s other complaints, including that “a significant portion of the crop being grown appeared to be marijuana,” the Navajo Justice Department said. “It became apparent that a significant number of foreign workers had been employed by these operations with significant financial investment.”

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