Anna Mae Aquash

First Nations activist (1945–1975)

Paul DeMain (Ojibwe/Oneida), publisher and editor of News from Indian Country, said that day,

blockquote| Anna Mae had a legacy of doing things differently, in 1975 she was alcohol and drug free, which made her stand out within the movement boldly because many people were still using and partying and there were many things going on in that area. On May 25, 2004, after Arlo Looking Cloud was convicted by the jury, Peltier withdrew the suit; he and DeMain reached a settlement.

In January 2003, a fourth federal grand jury was called in Rapid City to hear testimony about the murder of Aquash. She was known to have been given a ride from the home of Troy Lynn Yellow Wood of Denver on December 10, 1975, by AIM members Arlo Looking Cloud, John Graham and Theda Nelson Clarke, who transported her to Rapid City. They took Aquash further to the Pine Ridge Reservation in mid December. On March 20, 2003, a federal grand jury indicted Looking Cloud (an Oglala Lakota) and Graham (aka John Boy Patton; a Southern Tutchone Athabascan) from Whitehorse, Yukon, Canada for her murder. Although Clarke, Graham's adopted aunt, was alleged to have been involved, she was not indicted; by then, she was in failing health and being cared for in a nursing home. Bruce Ellison, who has been Leonard Peltier's lawyer since the 1970s, invoked his Fifth Amendment rights against self incrimination and refused to testify at the grand jury hearings on charges against Looking Cloud or at his trial in 2004. During the trial, the federal prosecutor referred to Ellison as a co conspirator in the Aquash case.

On February 8, 2004, the trial of Arlo Looking Cloud began before a U. S. federal jury; five days later he was found guilty of murder. On April 23, 2004, he was given a mandatory sentence of life in prison. Although no physical evidence linking Looking Cloud to the crime was presented, a videotape was shown in which he admitted to having been at the scene of the murder, but said he was not aware that Aquash was going to be killed. In that video, Looking Cloud was interviewed by Detective Abe Alonzo of the Denver Police Department and Robert Ecoffey, the Director of the Bureau of Indian Affairs Office of Law Enforcement Services. On March 27, 2003, Looking Cloud said that John Graham was the gunman. Looking Cloud said that he was making his statement while high and under the influence of "a little bit of alcohol." The United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit denied Looking Cloud's appeal. On August 19, 2005, the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit affirmed the judgment of conviction. Richard Two Elk, adopted brother of Looking Cloud; Troy Lynn Yellow Wood, former AIM chairman John Trudell, and Aquash's daughters Denise and Debbie Maloney were other witnesses who testified at the trial that Looking Cloud had separately confessed his involvement to them before any indictments or arrests.

On June 22, 2006, Canada's Minister of Justice, Vic Toews, ordered the extradition of John Graham to the United States to face charges on his alleged involvement in the murder of Aquash. Graham appealed the order and was held under house arrest with conditions. In July 2007, a Canadian court denied his appeal, and upheld the extradition order. On December 6, 2007, the Supreme Court of Canada denied Graham's second appeal of his extradition. In an interview, recorded in the studios of Pacifica Radio KPFK, Los Angeles March 30, 2004, when being asked by Antoinette Nora Claypoole about the last time he saw Annie Mae Aquash, Graham replied: "Last time when we drove from Denver to Pine Ridge, and you know that ride there going to Pine Ridge, and talking with her, gearing up. And then gettin to a safe house."

In August 2008, a federal grand jury indicted Vine Richard "Dick" Marshall with aiding and abetting the murder. Marshall was a bodyguard for Russell Means at the time of Aquash's murder. It was alleged that Graham, Looking Cloud, and Theda Nelson Clarke had taken Aquash to Marshall's house, where they held her, then took her to be executed in a far corner of the reservation. Marshall's wife, Cleo Gates, testified to this at Looking Cloud's trial. Marshall is alleged to have provided the murder weapon to Graham and Looking Cloud. Marshall was imprisoned in 1976 after being convicted in the 1975 shooting death of a man. He was paroled from prison in 2000. He was acquitted of the charge of conspiracy to murder Anna Mae.

In September 2009, Graham and Thelma Rios, a Lakota advocate in Rapid City, were charged by the State Court of South Dakota with the kidnapping, rape and murder of Anna Mae. The case against the defendants continued through much of 2010.

Thelma Conroy Rios, a longtime Lakota advocate in Rapid City, South Dakota was charged by the state of South Dakota in September 2009, along with John Graham, for the kidnapping, rape and murder of Aquash. Already in poor health, she avoided a trial on murder charges by agreeing to a plea bargain "that acknowledged her role in the events leading up to Aquash's death." In November 2010, she pleaded guilty to the charge of being an accessory to kidnapping and received a five year sentence, most of which was suspended due to her poor health. Rios died of lung cancer February 9, 2011. Although names were redacted in her plea agreement at court, she had said she heard two people ordering Aquash to be brought from Denver to Rapid City and that there was a discussion about "offing her".

On December 10, 2010, after two days of deliberation in the state court, jurors found John Graham guilty of felony murder, After an appeal by Graham, the South Dakota Supreme Court upheld the lower court conviction in May 2012.

Observers and historians speculate about who ordered the murder of Annie Mae Aquash. Before her death, Aquash allegedly said FBI Special Agent David Price threatened she would die within the year if she refused to inform on Leonard Peltier. John Trudell testified in both the 1976 Butler and Robideau trial and the 2004 Looking Cloud trial that Dennis Banks had told him that the body of Anna Mae Aquash had been found before it was officially identified. Banks wrote in his autobiography, Ojibwa Warrior, that Trudell told him that the body found was that of Aquash. Banks wrote that he did not know until then that Aquash had been killed, although she had been missing. In Looking Cloud's trial, the prosecution argued that AIM's suspicion of Aquash stemmed from her having heard Peltier admit to the murders of the FBI agents. Darlene "Kamook" Nichols, former wife of the AIM leader Dennis Banks, testified that in late 1975, Peltier told of shooting the FBI agents. He was talking to a small group of AIM activists who were fugitives from law enforcement. They included Nichols, her sister Bernie Nichols (later Lafferty), Nichols' husband Dennis Banks, and Aquash, among several others. Nichols testified that Peltier said, "The motherfucker was begging for his life, but I shot him anyway." Bernie Nichols Lafferty gave the same account of Peltier's statement. Other witnesses have testified that once Aquash came under suspicion as an informant, Peltier interrogated her while holding a gun to her head. Peltier and David Hill later had Aquash participate in bomb making so that her fingerprints would be on the bombs. The trio planted the bombs at two power plants on the Pine Ridge reservation. Extensive testimony suggests that AIM leaders ordered the murder of Aquash; because of her prominent position in the organization, lower ranking members would not have taken action against her without permission from above.

Together with federal and state investigators, Aquash's daughters Denise and Debbie believe that high ranking AIM leaders ordered the death of their mother due to fears of her being an informant; they support the continued investigation. In March 2018, Denise Maloney spoke at the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women inquiry in Montreal about her mother's murder.

After the conviction of Looking Cloud in 2004, Aquash's family had her remains exhumed. They were transported to her homeland of Nova Scotia for reinterment on June 21 at Indian Brook Reservation in Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia. They held appropriate Mi'kmaq ceremonies and celebrated the work and life of the activist. Family and supporters have held annual anniversary ceremonies in Aquash's honor since then.

The Spirit of Anna Mae (2002) – a 72 minute film directed by Catherine Anne Martin, a tribute by women who knew Aquash. Produced by the National Film Board of Canada (NFB). Maggie Eagle Bear – a leading character in the drama Thunderheart, loosely based on Aquash.