The massive number of arrests resulting from the months-long Dakota pipeline protests are overburdening North Dakota’s already overrun court system.
Police officers have made 575 arrests during clashes at the protesters’ main camp along the Dakota Access Pipeline’s route. The area doesn’t typically deal with these types of numbers, which could lead to huge cost overruns, experts told reporters Thursday.
“It is highly unusual,” H. Jean Delaney, the executive director of The Commission on Legal Counsel, said about the high number of arrests. The commission has accepted more than 225 protest-related cases, which are being handled by 65 defense attorneys.
Delaney’s group is considering hiring seven more attorneys for the caseload.
He added: “We did make a (similar) request once before, during the oil boom, in the 2013-15 biennium. It’s kind of interesting — it was kind of a similar situation, where court cases really grew.”
North Dakota’s judicial system will ask the state legislature next year for an additional $1.5 million to process the anti-DAPL protest-related arrests, said Sally Holewa, North Dakota’s state court administrator.
“This is a first,” Holewa said. “The judicial branch has never had to ask for a deficiency appropriation in its history,” dating back more than 100 years.
“Any time justice is unduly delayed, it causes issues,” she said, adding: “You have issues with people’s memories, and (in this case) you also have people from out of state — not just those charged, but also police officers from out of state. All of that makes it essential that we try to get these cases heard timely.”
Standing Rock Sioux, one of the American Indian tribes at the heart of the protests, has spent several months demonstrating against the $3.7 billion project, arguing the pipeline’s construction would trample on tribal lands and destroy artifacts. They also believe it could potentially poison waterways, including rivers such as the Missouri River and Lake Oahe.
Things could get worse before they get better for the state’s court system.
A small group of military veterans claim they are amassing a small, unarmed army to protect protesters if they are battered by police.
“We have created an entire military battalion in less than three weeks,” retired police officer Michael Wood Jr., who opposes the pipeline, told reporters Wednesday.
“This is your fight that if you don’t take up and you don’t promote and stand up for it now, you end up saying, ‘Why am I being run through? Why do I have lead in my water? Why is my water poisoned? Why do I have to do move?” Wood said.
He said more than 2,500 unarmed vets are mobilizing to stand between police and protesters.
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