The court of appeals affirmed an order of the district court. The court held that an Indian tribe that convicted an Indian in its tribal court of misdemeanor criminal child abuse was not required to prove her Indian status as an essential element of that offense.
The Yerington Paiute Tribe charged Leslie Dawn Eagle with criminal child abuse under the Tribe’s code. Under the code, the tribal court had criminal jurisdiction over Indians. The Tribe’s code also placed the burden of raising the Tribe’s lack of jurisdiction over nonIndians on the person claiming exemption from jurisdiction, while the burden of proving Indian status as a basis of jurisdiction remained on the prosecution.
