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SALT LAKE CITY — A federal judge has ruled that the Ute Tribal Court cannot hear a wrongful death lawsuit filed against 11 current and former Utah police officers by the family of a tribal member who committed suicide following a high-speed chase in 2007.
Judge Dee Benson, in a permanent injunction issued Monday, ruled that the tribal court lacks jurisdiction to hear the suit because none of the officers listed in the complaint filed by the parents of Todd Rory Murray in March are tribal members themselves.
Benson cited two U.S. Supreme Court opinions as the basis for this decision, noting that the high court has already established that "the inherent sovereign powers of an Indian tribe do not extend to the activities of non-members of the tribe."
"The (Supreme) Court has explained that 'by virtue of their incorporation into the American republic,' tribes 'lost the right of governing persons within their limits except themselves,'" Benson wrote. "The court also held that 'Congress has not stripped the states of their inherent jurisdiction on reservations with regard to off-reservation violations of state law."
Benson said the facts of the Murray case show the officers entered the reservation "pursuant to their official duties and in pursuit of a crime committed, at least in part, off-reservation."
In April 2007, a Utah Highway Patrol trooper tried to pull over a 17-year-old driver for speeding on U.S. 40 in Uintah County. Murray, 21, was a passenger in the car, according to court records.
When the driver refused to stop, a chase ensued that reached speeds of 125 mph before the car crashed near the reservation town of Ouray, troopers said. The teen and Murray ran from the car in opposite directions.
The trooper quickly caught the driver and arrested him without further incident. An off-duty Vernal police detective, a Uintah County sheriff's deputy and a second UHP trooper arrived and searched the area for Murray.
The off-duty detective said Murray fired a handgun at him from about 100 yards away, so he shot back and sought cover. The detective's rounds did not hit Murray, who ultimately shot himself in the head with a .380-caliber pistol, according to police.
Related:
Ute tribal member not murdered following 2007 chase, judge says
A federal judge has ruled that a Ute tribal member was not murdered by a police officer, as attorneys for his family have claimed, but died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. (Photo: Geoff Liesik/KSL-TV)The state medical examiner ruled Murray's death a suicide. An autopsy report showed he was "acutely intoxicated and had recently used methamphetamine" at the time of his death. There was also a $20,000 warrant outstanding for his arrest on pending drug charges.
Two years after his death, Murray's family filed a federal lawsuit against every state, county and city officer who responded to the incident. In their original $6 million complaint, they claimed the officers illegally pursued their son onto the Uintah-Ouray Indian Reservation.
Murray's parents contend that the chase began within the boundaries of the reservation, and that officers continued to pursue their son on foot after the crash even though they had no probable cause to believe that he — as a passenger in the car — had committed a crime.
They also claimed in court records that officers killed Murray, then orchestrated a cover-up to make it look like a suicide — an allegation repeated in the recently filed tribal court complaint and flatly rejected by U.S. District Judge Tena Campbell when she dismissed the family's federal lawsuit in March 2014.
"The plaintiffs' evidence is sparse, circumstantial, subject to more than one interpretation and at times very speculative," Campbell wrote in her 71-page decision. "Moreover, evidence to the contrary is strong and is consistent with a self-inflicted gunshot wound."
Murray's parents have asked the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn Campbell's ruling in the federal lawsuit. Their attorneys did not respond Wednesday to an email seeking comment on Benson's ruling about the tribal court lawsuit.
