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Double Jeopardy And Nonmember Indians In Indian Country, Terrill Pollman

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The ambivalence of the federal government to the sovereignty of native tribes is ordinarily a quiet fact of life in this country. Now, the federal circuits have disturbed that quiet by rendering opposing rulings on the question whether the Double Jeopardy Clause bars successive tribal/federal prosecution of nonmember Indians in Indian Country. The Ninth Circuit has held the Double Jeopardy Clause does not present a bar to successive tribal/federal prosecutions. In contrast, the Eighth Circuit has held that the Double Jeopardy Clause prohibits subsequent prosecution because the source of the tribe's jurisdiction, if it has jurisdictional power, is the same …