A former Ute Tribe employee has been indicted by a federal grand jury on extortion charges for allegedly requiring donations for tribal causes and sporting events from companies and individuals doing business on the Uintah and Ouray Reservation in northeastern Utah.
The indictment, issued Jan. 10, accuses Leallen Blackhair of using his position as supervisor of compliance at the Ute Energy and Minerals Department to extort approximately $110,000 from about 66 companies and individuals.
Blackhair allegedly required a donation to tribal athletic teams, athletic events and memorial funds in exchange for waiving fines for violations involving access permits and business licenses. The solicitations took place from August 2010 to May 2013, according to the indictment.
Blackhair, who is charged with nine counts of extortion under color of official right, faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted. The indictment also seeks forfeiture of $110,000 from him, the total amount allegedly extorted in the scheme.
Blackhair, 41, could not be reached Wednesday for comment.
Companies that conduct oil and gas business on the reservation are required to get access permits, which list all of their vehicles that are on the reservation, according to the indictment. If a company was found in violation, compliance officers were to escort its employees off the reservation until the violation was remedied and to refer the matter to Blackhair, the indictment says.
The charges single out nine payments allegedly made by eight oil and gas companies. Eight of the payments ranged from $1,000 to $2,500 and one was $5,500, the indictment says.
In addition to law enforcement agencies, the tribe had initiated a probe into complaints about solicitations. The Ute Business Committee passed a resolution in January 2014 requesting an investigation to determine if there had been solicitation of payments in lieu of fines.
Baker Street Group, a San Diego-based private dectective agency, was hired by the tribe to investigate and produced an interim report in May 2014 on the matter. (The report says the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the FBI also were making inquiries into Blackhair’s activities.)
According to the Baker Street Group report, Blackhair began to solicit donations for a Jackie Murray Memorial Softball Tournament sometime after the namesake’s November 2013 death. Murray’s relatives made a formal complaint in January 2014 to the Ute Business Committee, saying Blackhair was violating a tribal custom by seeking donations for the event during a one-year family grieving period.
The Baker Street Group — noting it was asked to limit its investigation to Blackhair’s personal gain — said it identified 10 alleged victims who paid the then-employee a total of $30,080 from May 2011 until March 2016. Blackhair appears to have used some of the money he collected for athletic events, the report says.
Blackhair was supervisor of compliance from 2009 until May 2013, when he was fired from the position, according to the report. He was re-hired as a temporary conservation officer at the tribe’s Fish and Wildlife Management Department in August 2013 and formally terminated as an empoloyee in January 2014, the report says.
Utah state court records show that Blackhair pleaded guilty in abeyance in 2007 to making a fraudulent insurance claim and agreed to pay $1,500 in restitution, the report says. The case was dismissed after he paid the restitution.
The Baker Street Group report became public when it was filed by attorneys for Duchesne County as part of an ongoing federal lawsuit involving the boundaries of Ute Indian Tribe lands and which agencies can prosecute tribal members and nonmembers for crimes on and off the reservation. The suit — which was filed in 1975 — has pitted the tribe against Utah and Uintah and Duchesne counties.
Duchesne County filed the report in 2014 to support its allegations that Ute tribal officials had engaged in a pattern of racketeering and bribery. The tribe has denied those claims.
An initial court appearance for Blackhair is set for Feb. 12 in U.S. District Court.
