Supreme Court Rejects Indian Tribe's Case

[Rose Siding]

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court refused Monday to consider whether the state of New York owed an Indian tribe about $250 million in a dispute over the seizure of tribal land.

Justices had been asked to consider a decision by the New York-based 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that dismissed the Cayuga Nation's 26-year-old land claim for several reasons, including the passage of time and the tribe's long delay in seeking relief.

A federal judge ruled in 1994 that New York state illegally acquired 64,015 acres of tribal land in Seneca and Cayuga counties in the late 1700s and early 1800s by entering into invalid treaties with the Cayugas.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/15/AR2006051500529.html