Tribal Advisory Board

Judge Michelle Brown‐Yazzie
Chief Judge for the Mescalero Apache Tribe in New Mexico

Judge Michelle Brown-Yazzie is an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation and is also of Salish and Kootenai and Oglala Lakota descent. Judge Brown-Yazzie has served in the judiciary since 2011 and is currently the Chief Judge for the Mescalero Apache Tribe in New Mexico. She is a member of the New Mexico Tribal-State Judicial Consortium and the New Mexico Children’s Court Improvement Commission appointed to both positions by the New Mexico Supreme Court. Prior to becoming a judge, she practiced law as Staff Attorney and Senior Prosecutor for the Navajo Nation, Prosecutor for the Gila River Indian Community, State of New Mexico Assistant District Attorney for McKinley County, and was partner at Smith & Brown-Yazzie LLP. During her career, Judge Brown-Yazzie also served several political appointments including, Deputy Cabinet Secretary for the New Mexico Indian Affairs Department appointed by then NM Governor Bill Richardson, Executive Director of the Navajo Nation’s Washington (D.C.) Office appointed by then Navajo Nation President Kelsey Begaye and Legal Counsel to the Navajo Nation’s Office of the President and Vice-President also appointed by President Begaye. Judge Brown-Yazzie is also a former NM Indian Affairs Commissioner (Chair) and NM Crime Victims Reparation Commission Board Member. Judge Brown-Yazzie currently serves on the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) National and New Mexico Boards.
Judge Brown-Yazzie received her J.D. in 1999 from the University of Iowa College Of Law, her B.A. in English and Political Science in 1995 from the University of New Mexico and is licensed to practice law in the U.S. Supreme Court, the State of New Mexico and on the Navajo Nation. Judge Brown-Yazzie joined the faculty of The National Judicial College in 2016.

Charles Cloud
Judge of the District Court 4th Judicial District (retired)

Former member of The National Judicial College’s Board of Trustees, director of the National Center for State Courts and chair of the ABA, Judicial Division’s Tribal Courts Council.

Judge Ingrid Cumberlidge
Chief Judge on the Qagan Tayagungin Tribal Court of Sand Point

Judge E. Ingrid Cumberlidge makes her home with her two sons, in Sand Point, Alaska. Judge Cumberlidge was first a sitting judge, and has now been chief judge, on the Qagan Tayagungin Tribal Court of Sand Point for over 16 years. She is a representative for Alaska’s Tribal Courts and is on The National Tribal Judicial Center Council at The National Judicial College in Reno, Nevada. Judge Cumberlidge has participated in several National Judicial College tribal court training events, the Alaska Bar Association, and the Federal Bar Association Indian Law Judicial Forums. Judge Cumberlidge also participated as a State/Tribal Advocacy Team member for the Aleut Region throughout the Millennium Agreement negotiations. Judge Cumberlidge and the Qagan Tayagungin Tribal Court have recently formalized a direct case referral to Tribal Court agreements with the Alaska Division of Juvenile Justice and the Alaska State Court System. In addition, Judge Cumberlidge is also a teacher. Her other life experiences have included commercial fishing, small business ownership, and grant management, to name a few. Judge Cumberlidge joined the faculty of The National Judicial College in 2002.

Lisa Dickinson
Attorney, Dickinson Law Firm

Her practice areas at the Dickinson Law Firm, PLLC, include civil and commercial litigation, business law, creditors’ rights, creditor bankruptcy, employment law, probate litigation, land use, entertainment law, Indian law, and contract disputes. Not only is she a noteworthy attorney, being recognized statewide as a “Rising Star” by Washington Law and Politics, and named in the “Best Lawyers” receiving the highest rating for a number of years in Spokane/Coeur d’Alene Living Magazine, she is a “rock star” in that she devotes about half of her practice to volunteering. Ms. Dickinson states that, “being able to give back to groups and to other individuals is my biggest professional success”. She has worked on the boards of various legal and community organizations such as Director of Rotary Club 21, Board President of Northwest Justice Project, Board Member of the Martin Luther King Jr. Family Outreach Center, Board Member and Legal Advisor for Communities in Schools, Spokane, President, Washington Women Lawyers, Spokane, Commissioner and Second Vice-Chair on the Washington State Commission on Asian Pacific American Affairs, and as Legal Advisor to Spokane JACL. She also works part-time as a pro tem judge for the Washington State Office of Administrative Hearings (Administrative Law Judge), as Appellate Justice and Judge Pro Tem for the Nez Perce Tribe, Supreme Court Chief Justice and Judge Pro Tem for the Coeur d’Alene Tribe, and as an Appellate Court Justice for the Northwest Intertribal Court System.

Matthew L.M. Fletcher
Professor of Law at Michigan State University College of Law and Director of the Indigenous Law and Policy Center

Matthew L.M. Fletcher is Professor of Law at Michigan State University College of Law and Director of the Indigenous Law and Policy Center. He sits as the Chief Justice of the Poarch Band of Creek Indians Supreme Court and also sits as an appellate judge for the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians, the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe, the Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians, the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians, the Hoopa Valley Tribe, the Nottawaseppi Huron Band of Potawatomi Indians, and the Santee Sioux Tribe of Nebraska. He is a member of the Grand Traverse Band, located in Peshawbestown, Michigan.

He is the Reporter for the American Law Institute’s Restatement of the Law of American Indians. He recently published a hornbook, Federal Indian Law (West Academic Publishing 2016). Professor Fletcher co-authored the sixth and seventh editions of Cases and Materials on Federal Indian Law (West Publishing 2011 and 2017). With Wenona Singel and Kathryn Fort, Professor Fletcher is under contract with the American Bar Association to write a tribal law practice guide. He also authored American Indian Tribal Law (Aspen 2011), the first casebook for law students on tribal law; The Return of the Eagle: The Legal History of the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians (Michigan State University Press 2012); and American Indian Education: Counternarratives in Racism, Struggle, and the Law (Routledge 2008). He co-edited The Indian Civil Rights Act at Fortywith Kristen A. Carpenter and Angela R. Riley (UCLA American Indian Studies Press 2012), and Facing the Future: The Indian Child Welfare Act at 30 with Wenona T. Singel and Kathryn E. Fort (Michigan State University Press 2009). Professor Fletcher’s scholarship has been cited twice by the United States Supreme Court; in more than a dozen federal, state, and tribal courts; in dozens of federal, state, and tribal court briefs; and in hundreds of law review articles and other secondary legal authorities. Finally, Professor Fletcher is the primary editor and author of the leading law blog on American Indian law and policy, Turtle Talk, http://turtletalk.wordpress.com/.

Professor Fletcher graduated from the University of Michigan Law School in 1997 and the University of Michigan in 1994. He has worked as a staff attorney for four Indian Tribes – the Pascua Yaqui Tribe, the Hoopa Valley Tribe, the Suquamish Tribe, and the Grand Traverse Band He previously sat on the judiciaries of the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians, the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians, the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe, and the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians; and served as a consultant to the Seneca Nation of Indians Court of Appeals. He is married to Wenona Singel, a member of the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians, and they have two sons, Owen and Emmett.

Heather Kendall-Miller
Senior staff attorney for the Native American Right Fund (NARF)

Heather Kendall-Miller is a senior staff attorney for the Native American Right Fund (NARF), working in its Anchorage, Alaska, office. She is a lawyer, teacher and mentor whose legal experience includes cases involving subsistence, tribal sovereignty, human rights, and taxation. In 2001, she was instrumental in winning the Katie John subsistence hunting and fishing rights case. She has worked with other Alaska Native communities including the Native Village of Venetie, the Native Village of Kluti Kaah, the Native Village of Barrow, and the Nome Eskimo community. Prior to joining NARF, she worked with Sonosky, Chambers, Sasche & Miller in Anchorage, Alaska, and in Washington, D.C., on legislative research and writing memoranda for litigation. From 1992 to 1994, she was a Skadden Fellow where she worked as a staff attorney for the Alaska Legal Services Corporation representing indigent clients in court and in administrative hearings. During the second year of her fellowship she worked for NARF as a research attorney assisting in trial preparation for tribal status, among other cases. Her civic activities include serving on the Honoring Nations Advisory Board of the Ford Foundation and as a board member of the Alaska Conservation Foundation. She is former chair of the Indian Law Section of the Alaska Bar Association (1996-1997) and she served on the Alaska Supreme Court Committee on Fairness and Access to the Judicial System (1997). She is Athabascan. She received a history degree, magna cum laude, from the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, (1988). She received her M.A. J.D. from Harvard University Law School (1991).

Hon. Vincent L. Knight
District Court Judge for the Comanche Nation

Judge Knight is currently serving his second term as District Court Judge for the Comanche Nation. Judge Knight has served as judge for many tribes including the Mescalero Apache Tribe, Jicarilla Apache Tribe and the Hualapai Nation to name a few. He also had the honor to serve as the first Tribal Law and Order Act judge for the Gila River Indian Community hearing felony cases in Indian Country. He is a former tribal prosecutor and defense counsel and has had the opportunity to sit on a variety of regional and national committees addressing issues impacting Indian Country. Judge Knight has taught at the National Judicial College since 2006 in a variety of areas for the Tribal Center. He is honored to serve for a second term representing the tribal courts on the NJC Faculty Council. Judge Knight is a graduate of the University of Oklahoma and the University of New Mexico School of Law. He lives at home in Albuquerque, NM with his family and is a member of the Pueblo of Laguna and of Ponca decent.

Colleen Lamarre
Associate at Phillips Lytle LLP in Buffalo, New York

Ms. Lamarre (Mohawk) is an associate at Phillips Lytle LLP in Buffalo, New York. Ms. Lamarre concentrates her practice in corporate law, particularly tax planning, executive compensation and employee benefits (ERISA). She counsels a broad spectrum of employers regarding the design, documentation, legal compliance, and administration of qualified and non-qualified retirement plans, health and welfare plans, and executive compensation plans. She regularly advises clients on the Affordable Care Act’s employer mandate and reporting requirements. She is admitted to practice law in New York and California and is well versed in all aspects of federal and New York State tax and tax-related matters, including corporate tax compliance and planning with respect to standard business operations, mergers, and acquisitions. Ms. Lamarre’s experience includes representation on general matters involving Native American tribes and business entities.

Ms. Lamarre received her J.D. from Cornell Law School and an L.LM. in Taxation from New York University School of Law. She is an American Bar Association Equal Opportunity Scholar, and was President of the Cornell Chapter of the Native American Law Students Association. While in law school, Ms. Lamarre clerked at the Native American Rights Fund (NARF). Ms. Lamarre was a Bench Editor of the Cornell Law School Moot Court Board where she wrote and judged moot court competitions. As a member of the Cornell Law School Land Use Clinic, Ms. Lamarre published a note in the Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy,Owning the Center of the Earth: Hydraulic Fracturing and Subsurface Trespass in the Marcellus Shale Region. Ms. Lamarre holds an A.B.in Government and Middle Eastern Studies from Dartmouth College.

Ms. Lamarre is a member of the American Bar Association and the New York State Bar Association, Tax Law Section and Young Lawyers Division. She currently serves as the National Native American Bar Association’s representative to the ABA Young Lawyers Division Council. She is Treasurer of the Western New York Chapter of the Women’s Bar Association of State of New York. Ms. Lamarre also serves on the Board of Directors of Western New York United Against Alcohol and Drug Abuse, Inc., a community based prevention agency designed to increase awareness and educate individuals to prevent substance abuse.

Gary E. LaRance
Member of the Hopi Tribe of Arizona

Graduate of the Santa Clara School of Law, Santa Clara, California. Admitted to practice in Arizona and the Navajo Nation and Hopi Tribal Courts. Former Chief Judge of the Fort McDowell Yavapai Tribal Court, Hopi Tribal Court and Colorado River Indian Tribes Tribal Court.

Stacy L. Leeds
Vice Chancellor for Economic Development, Dean Emeritus and Professor of Law at the University of Arkansas

Stacy L. Leeds is Vice Chancellor for Economic Development, Dean Emeritus and Professor of Law at the University of Arkansas. As Vice Chancellor, she provides leadership for campus-wide engagement, collaboration, and outreach to citizens, businesses, governmental and nonprofit entities in Arkansas and beyond. She works closely with UA’s ten colleges, schools and divisions to amplify the university’s economic and social impact. The University of Arkansas is the state’s flagship and a land-grant research institution serving over 27,000 students.

From 2011-2018, Dean Leeds served as the twelfth dean of the University of Arkansas School of Law. She is the only native woman to have served as a law school dean in the United States. She currently teaches American Indian law, including a legal clinic. Prior to joining the University of Arkansas, Leeds was a professor and administrator at the University of Kansas and the University of North Dakota. She began her academic career as a William H. Hastie Fellow at the University of Wisconsin School of Law. She is a recipient of the American Bar Association’s Spirit of Excellence Award, an elected member of the American Law Institute and a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation. She is a former Alphonse Fletcher, Sr. Fellow affiliated with the W.E.B. DuBois Institute at Harvard University and a former Sequoyah Fellow at Northeastern State University.

Mike McBride III
Chair of Crowe & Dunlevy’s Indian Law & Gaming

Mike McBride chairs Crowe & Dunlevy’s Indian Law & Gaming practice group out of the Tulsa office. He is a trial, appellate and business lawyer. He is a sought-after and trusted advisor with extensive experience in gaming, federal Indian law, litigation and complex transactions. Mike has tried more than 50 cases to conclusion in federal, tribal and state courts including numerous jury trials; as a Judge and Justice, he has adjudicated scores more and authored many published decisions. He excels in gaming regulatory matters, bet-the-tribe litigation, tribal government matters, economic development and regulatory matters. Corporations, investment funds and individuals have hired him as a consultant and as an expert witness in multiple federal state court cases to testify on Indian gaming matters.

He is Executive Vice President for the International Masters of Gaming Law and has served in the organization for a decade and a half. Mike has served as Attorney General for the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma, the Sac & Fox Nation and a number of other tribes, companies and others involving federal Indian law.

He has practiced for a quarter century and has represented scores of tribal governments and gaming companies. He served the Kaw and Pawnee Nations as a Supreme Court Justice. He is past Chair of the Federal Bar Association’s Indian Law Section, General Counsel to the FBA, and Past-Chair of the Oklahoma Bar Association’s Indian Law Section. He served the American Bar Association on the Standing Committee for Judicial Independence. Chambers & Partners have recognized him as a “Star Individual”, its highest rating for several years. Peers in Best Lawyers and Super Lawyers have recognized Mike with its highest ratings for Indian law and Gaming law.

Sandra McCandless
Head of Dentons’ Employment and Labor practice in California

Sandra McCandless is the head of Dentons’ Employment and Labor practice in California. She represents management in all aspects of labor and employment, including class action and individual litigation, arbitration, mediation and the provision of employment-related advice.

Sandra has a highly successful track record of representing employers in a wide variety of industries in both the unionized and nonunion sectors—technology, banking, insurance, hotels, manufacturing, automotive, food, trucking, retail, garments, maritime and trade, among others—in matters throughout the labor and employment continuum, from employment contract drafting and collective bargaining negotiations to wrongful termination and discrimination litigation. She has a long track record of winning employment cases on summary judgment and successful representation of employers before government agencies.

She is one of a handful of employment lawyers in the United States who are experienced in the representation of Indian tribes, tribal casinos and other tribal businesses.

Sandra has also practiced in the international arena throughout her career, representing many Asian and European companies doing business in the US. She has assisted multinational companies on the broad spectrum of labor and employment issues across the globe, working on matters involving Asian, European, Middle Eastern and African operations, as well as those in North America.

In addition to her representation of companies in employment matters, Sandra also serves as a neutral arbitrator for the American Arbitration Association, as an early neutral evaluator for the United States District Court for the Northern District of California and as a member of the College of Labor and Employment. Attainment of these roles involves a highly competitive selection process.

Sandra recently completed a three-year term on the board of governors of the American Bar Association and as chair of its Finance Committee. She is also the chair of the Employment and Immigration Committee and a council member of the Inter-Pacific Bar Association, an international association of business lawyers with a focus on the Pacific Rim; a board member of the California-Asia Business Council and of the National Native American Bar Association Foundation; and a trustee of the Tony Award-winning Berkeley Repertory Theatre.

Earlier in her career Sandra, was a lawyer for the Appellate Court Litigation Branch of the National Labor Relations Board in Washington, DC.

David Raasch
Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohican Indians

Judge David D. Raasch is an enrolled member of the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohican Indians. Now enjoying retirement, he has served as a Tribal Project Specialist for the National Criminal Justice Training Center (NCJTC) at Fox Valley Technical College. NCJTC provides training and technical assistance for law enforcement agencies and justice systems, including Native American communities throughout the United States. Prior to joining Fox Valley Technical College, David was a police officer in Shawano, WI and then the clerk of municipal court for the City of Green Bay, WI for 20 years, retiring in 2004. From 1995-2005 he was the Chief Judge of the Mohican Nation Tribal Court and served an additional 3 years as an Associate Judge. He is the Vice President of the Board of Directors for the Tribal Law and Policy Institute in West Hollywood, CA, serves on the Corporate Board of Directors for CASA of Brown County and the Board of Directors for Wisconsin Judicare. He also is a past president of the Wisconsin Tribal Judges’ Association. Judge Raasch assisted in the production of Tribal Nations: The Story of Federal Indian Law, which is a 60 minute documentary, and is a national speaker on topics of reparative justice, peacemaking and developing cross jurisdictional relationships. He was also selected to serve on the Tribal Law and Order Act Advisory Committee. Currently, he works as an independent consultant and in his free time he enjoys his 5 grandchildren and reading. Judge Raasch is an alumnus of The National Judicial College and has been on the faculty of The National Tribal Judicial Center at The National Judicial College since 2002.

Fawn Sharp
President of the Quinault Indian Nation in Taholah, Washington

Fawn R. Sharp is the current President of the Quinault Indian Nation in Taholah, Washington. Her past positions included managing attorney and lead counsel; and staff attorney for the Quinault Indian Nation, administrative law judge for the Washington state Department of Revenue – Tax Appeals Division, Quinault Tribal Court Associate Judge, and Counsel for Phillips, Krause & Brown.

Ms. Sharp has held numerous leadership positions, including an appointment by Governor Gary Locke to serve as Trustee for Grays Harbor College, Governor of the Washington State Bar Association, Trustee of Washington State Bar Association – Indian Law Section, Vice President and Founding Member for the National Intertribal Tax Alliance, and Director/Secretary of the Quinault Nation Enterprises Board. Fawn has conducted lectures and publications all over the United States.

Ms. Sharp graduated with a Bachelor of Arts from Gonzaga University in Spokane Washington at the age of 19. She received her Juris Doctorate from the University of Washington in 1995 and has subsequently received certificates from the National Judicial College at the University of Nevada, and from the International Human Rights Law at Oxford University.

Hilary Tompkins
Solicitor for the U.S. Department of the Interior

Hilary C. Tompkins has expansive experience in natural resources and environmental law at the highest levels of government. Most recently, she served in the presidentially appointed, Senate-confirmed position of Solicitor for the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) – the agency responsible for the management and conservation of public lands, natural and wildlife resource programs, and the trustee for Native American tribes.

In that role, she led over 300 attorneys in 16 offices nationwide and acquired significant experience in onshore and offshore energy development (conventional and renewable), the administration of federal water projects, conservation and wildlife legal requirements, and public land law.

Hilary oversaw litigation in support of Interior decisions, including cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, and issued landmark legal opinions. Her accomplishments include development of legal reforms following Deepwater Horizon, the successful defense of the first renewables on public lands, and resolving complex disputes involving multi-stakeholder projects under the Endangered Species Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, and the National Historic Preservation Act, among other statutes. Interior clients included the Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, Fish and Wildlife Service, Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, and the Bureau of Reclamation.

Hilary is also a leader in federal Indian law, where she led the historic settlement of the largest class action lawsuit in U.S. history – the Cobell tribal trust litigation. She is well-versed in Indian gaming, treaty rights, tribal trust land, water rights, and tribal sovereign immunity. Hilary also has experience advancing economic development projects in Indian country.

Before serving as DOI Solicitor, Hilary was counsel to New Mexico’s governor, acting as his chief legal adviser on all matters from appointment of judges and interpretation of constitutional authority to enactment of legislative initiatives. She was also a special assistant U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of New York. Hilary began her legal career as an honors program trial attorney in the Environment and Natural Resources Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, where she handled civil prosecutions in environmental cases nationwide. Hilary is an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation.

Ron Whitener
Chief Judge of the Tulalip Tribal Court

Ron J. Whitener is Chief Judge of the Tulalip Tribal Court, a Justice on the Northwest Intertribal Court of Appeals, the Chehalis Tribal Court of Appeals and the Upper Skagit Tribal Court of Appeals. From 2009 to 2013, Judge Whitener served as the Chief Judge for the Confederated Tribes of the Chehalis Reservation. Judge Whitener is a member of the Squaxin Island Tribe, located in South Puget Sound, where he grew up and continues to participate in treaty fishing and as the Squaxin Island Commissioner of Business Affairs. Judge Whitener worked for Squaxin Island in their Natural Resources Department prior to going to law school. He graduated from the University of Washington Law School in 1994 and returned to Squaxin as a tribal attorney representing the tribal government in treaty rights defense, tribal governance, tribal court development, gaming and other enterprises. In 2000, he joined the Northwest Justice Project’s Native American Unit in Seattle where he represented Native American clients in federal, state and tribal courts. In 2002, he joined the University of Washington Law School as an Assistant Professor where, with funding and support of the Tulalip Tribes, he formed the Tribal Court Public Defense Clinic serving as public defender for several Western Washington tribes. Judge Whitener taught various courses in the fields of Indian law, mental health law and criminal law and was named Order of the Coif and Order of Barristers for his work in law and his experience as a courtroom advocate. He received funding from the MacArthur Foundation to implement culturally-informed projects in tribal juvenile justice in the areas of indigent juvenile defense and mental health issues. In 2009, he was named the Association of American Law School’s “Shanara Gilbert Emerging Clinician of the Year” and in 2011 he was named a “White House Champion of Change” by President Barack Obama for his advocacy for Native American clients. In May of 2014, Judge Whitener left the University of Washington to join the Tulalip Tribal Court.

Robert Williams
Regents’ Professor, E. Thomas Sullivan Professor of Law and Faculty Co-Chair of the University of Arizona Indigenous Peoples Law and Policy Program

Robert A. Williams, Jr. is the Regents’ Professor, E. Thomas Sullivan Professor of Law and Faculty Co-Chair of the University of Arizona Indigenous Peoples Law and Policy Program. Professor Williams received his B.A. from Loyola College (1977) and his J.D. from Harvard Law School (1980). He was named the first Oneida Indian Nation Visiting Professor of Law at Harvard Law School (2003-2004), having previously served there as Bennet Boskey Distinguished Visiting Lecturer of Law. He is the author of The American Indian in Western Legal Thought:  The Discourses of Conquest (1990), which received the Gustavus Meyers Human Rights Center Award as one of the outstanding books published in 1990 on the subject of prejudice in the United States. He has also written Linking Arms Together:  American Indian Treaty Visions of Law and Peace, 1600-1800 (1997) and Like a Loaded Weapon:  The Rehnquist Court, Indian Rights and the Legal History of Racism in America (2005). He is co-author of Federal Indian Law:  Cases and Materials (6th ed., with David Getches, Charles Wilkinson, and Matthew Fletcher, 2011). His latest book is Savage Anxieties:  The Invention of Western Civilization (Palgrave Macmillan 2012). The 2006 recipient of the University of Arizona Koffler Prize for Outstanding Accomplishments in Public Service, Professor Williams has received major grants and awards from the Soros Senior Justice Fellowship Program of the Open Society Institute, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Council of Learned Societies, the U.S. Department of Education, the U.S. Department of Justice, and the National Institute of Justice. He has been interviewed by Bill Moyers and quoted on the front page of the New York Times. He has represented tribal groups and members before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Peoples, the United States Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court of Canada. Professor Williams served as Chief Justice for the Court of Appeals, Pascua Yaqui Indian Reservation, and as Justice for the Court of Appeals and trial judge pro tem for the Tohono O’odham Nation. He was named one of 2011’s “Heroes on the Hill” by Indian Country Today for his human rights advocacy work as Lead Counsel for the Hul’qumi’num Treaty Group of Canada before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. He lives and works in Tucson, Arizona.

Robert Yazzie
Chief Justice Emeritus of the Navajo Nation

Robert Yazzie is a citizen of and Chief Justice Emeritus of the Navajo Nation. He served as Chief Justice from 1992 through 2003. He practiced law in the Navajo Nation for 16 years, and was a district judge for eight years. He was formerly the Director of the Diné Policy Institute of Diné College (Navajo Nation) developing policy using authentic Navajo thinking. He is a visiting professor at the University of New Mexico School of Law, an adjunct professor of the Department of Criminal Justice of Northern Arizona University, and a visiting member of the faculty of theNational Judicial College. He recently taught Navajo law at the Crownpoint Institute of Technology.
Yazzie earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Oberlin College of Ohio, and a Juris Doctor degree from the University of New Mexico School of Law. He is a member of the Navajo Nation BarAssociation. He is the author of articles and book chapters on many subjects, including Navajo peacemaking, traditional Indian law, and international human rights law. Yazzie continues a career devoted to education in formal participation in faculties, lectures, and discussions of traditional indigenous law at various venues throughout the world. He has a global audience and he has frequently visited foreign lands to share his wisdom about traditional indigenous justice and governance.

Charles R. Zeh
Attorney

Charles R. Zeh practices primarily in the areas of Administrative Law, Tribal Law, Business, Civil Litigation, Employment, Government (the Reno Housing Authority and Tribes), Land Use and Economic Development. He has also represented clients before the Nevada Gaming Control Board and the Nevada Gaming Commission. His work on behalf of State administrative bodies includes appearances before the Courts in Clark County, Washoe County, Carson City and the Nevada Supreme Court, when he has repeatedly succeeded in defending the Boards’ decision.

Mr. Zeh is active in civic affairs of the community in addition to his planning commission work. He is the former Chairperson of the YMCA of the Sierra Board of Directors and served for five consecutive terms as Chairperson of the Board of Managers of the Reno Family YMCA. He chaired the Environment and Land Use Sub-Committee of “One Region, One Vision.” He is also the former Chairman and Chairman Emeritus of the Board of Directors of the Washoe Association for Retarded Citizens (WARC).

He is a member of the State Bars of Nevada and Minnesota and is admitted to practice before the United States District Court for the Districts of Nevada and Minnesota. He is also admitted before the United States Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and the United States Supreme Court. Mr. Zeh is a member of the Nevada and Washoe County Bar Associations.