DETROIT LAKES — A Mahnomen man’s wild rice offense was dismissed for the second time this week, this time with prejudice.
Todd Thompson, a White Earth Band member, was initially ticketed for a petty misdemeanor over illegal equipment while harvesting wild rice on Sept. 8, 2023. A dismissal with prejudice means the state will not be able to charge Thompson with the same offense.
Thompson said he uses a modified airboat — a type of craft that the White Earth Nation said is prohibited to use for ricing on on-reservation waters. He said he was stopped by DNR officials at Shell Lake off-reservation earlier in the day, and these officials said he could rice this way. But he was later cited after questioning at Height of Day Lake in Becker County.
The case was dismissed in Becker County a few months later, but recharged again last August, right before another wild rice season.
Thompson is no stranger to fighting the state in court over treaty rights, demonstrating for rights to net for fish on Hole in the Day Bay on Gull Lake in 2015. His charges in that case were also dismissed.
Thompson said by phone on Thursday, March 13, that the Department of Natural Resources, which issued the ticket, needs to be educated on treaty rights and obligations.
“How many cases has it got to be for them to stop bothering our people?” he asked.
He described the state’s actions on ceded lands toward Native people as harassment.
"We still have these state guys in our treaty territory, the state guys not respecting our rights," he explained. “Then if we get ticketed, we get ticketed wrongfully. ... We have to argue our rights in court. It's wrong.”
Thompson filed the motion to dismiss the case due to unnecessary delay on behalf of the prosecutors.
“The State failed to formally charge Thompson upon his request, waited several months before dismissing the original case, and then waited over six more months before recharging the case,” wrote Judge Michelle Lawson in her March 13 order granting the dismissal.
“There is no evidence in the record to suggest that Thompson has done anything to contribute to the delays. On the contrary, he has consistently taken steps to resolve this matter in a timely fashion.”
In a brief filed Jan. 24, prosecutors wrote in a footnote that the case was not about Thompson’s right to harvest rice, but his method.
“[Thompson] and his co-defendants try to act like they are doing something noble and practicing their treaty rights but in reality, many Native Americans who live near Shell Lake ... were upset about them harvesting wild rice with a motorboat,” wrote Assistant County Attorney Fallon Anderson in a request to deny the motions for dismissal. The brief also notes White Earth Tribal Secretary Michael Laroche contacted law enforcement to stop Thompson and other co-defendants.
Thompson asserted the 1855 treaty that guarantees Anishinaabe people the rights to hunt, fish and gather on ceded territory are the supreme law of the land, with these pacts created between tribes and the federal government before Minnesota was even a state.
Thompson added ricing is a crucial part of his cultural heritage.
"It's part of our survival here, why we're living,” he said. “And it's something that, amongst other things, we respect.”
Thompson was represented by Claire Glenn of the Climate Defense Fund. She described the judge’s dismissal with prejudice as a “rare victory.”
“In doing so, Judge Lawson credited Mr. Thompson’s 'concerns about further incidents with law-enforcement' that had prevented him from participating in the last two ricing seasons,” Glenn wrote in a news release.
