A Mexican Crossing Lines – #FreeKathleenBennett

A Mexican Crossing Lines – March 18, 2017- #FreeKathleenBennett

82 Year Old Lakota Elder Kidnapped by Bismarck, ND Hospital while Daughter is imprisoned in Morton County by False charges of Elder Abuse

#FreeKathleenBennett

Background
Last summer, we began to go to Standing Rock to provide on the ground coverage of the largest Indigenous gathering and movement in our history.  Our goal was to change the narrative of local ND mainstream media coverage of the movement and have the voices, stories, inspiration and insight of the people at the camps heard by our community.  We visited the oceti sakowin camp 5 times between August and November. We have months of podcasts on our website at https://kpppfm.com/updates-on-standing-rock/.

My wife is Cindy Gomez-Schempp, we are working together in this organization.  She has a background in media, advocacy, organizing and legal work. I also have been a trained Community Organizer and have run people and community powered nonprofits for over 25 years.

In December, Cindy received a call from Josh Long.  He had been at oceti sakowin in December and someone he had met had a problem dealing with his grandma being taken by a hospital against the families will.  Cindy has a great advocacy and legal background and contacted Russel Vasquez in the hope she could give him some advice on his situation.  Russel explained that he was at camp with his mother Kathleen Bennett and his 82 year old grandmother Mary Trujillo and they had taken her to a hospital in Bismarck for a check-up.

On December 23rd the hospital abruptly isolated Mary and barred Russel and Kathleen from seeing or caring for her.  Cindy attempted to do some legal referrals and a week later Kathleen Bennett was at the Morton County Court House to petition for the guardianship of her mother to the court and they arrested her with a charge of elder abuse. Morton County put the court house in lock-down and put Kathleen Bennett in jail and charged her with Endangering a Vulnerable Adult.

We decided that we needed to do more investigation and produce media coverage of this injustice. The Bismarck Tribune produced and article that focused on testimony from a Bill Running Fisher that claimed that he found the 82 year old Lakota Elder zip tied to a chair, half naked, caked in feces and urine and that she was abused by her daughter. We immediately began seeking the truth behind these allegations.

We have numerous recorded interviews and evidence that proves all of these allegations are fabrications, hearsay and lies. We have recorded interviews from Bill Running Fisher, Loreal Black Shawl, Wesley Clark Jr., Michael Wood, Melanie Stoneman and many others who have a connection to this kidnapping of Mary Tujillo and false imprisonment of Kathleen Bennett.

We have been compiling and airing many shows that have extensive information, timelines, evidence, Facebook live shows, radio podcasts and documents that if read or listen to comprehensively will show that this is a story reeks of corruption of media, government and camp infiltration focused on incriminating Kathleen Bennett and is/was ultimately directed at dismantling the camp and the movement.

 

Take some time to look at our evidence and coverage of this story.  We need a larger media and community presence on this story.  Please do not take too long though, as we speak, Mary Trujillo is still being held hostage in a hospital in Bismarck and Kathleen Bennett is still in jail in Morton County facing 15 years for a crime she did not commit.

2 Comments

  1. Thank you Cindy for bringing us continued coverage of this story, many of us are following the story and look forward to hearing from Russell and Michael. Let them know that I support them.

    Reply
  2. Thank you Cindy for never dropping the story on Elder Mary and seeing Melanie exposed!

    Reply

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