Thirty years ago First Nation people already formed the majority of inmates in federal penitentiaries like Stony Mountain Institution. In fact Stony Mountain penitentiary was build in the 1880s to house indigenous inmates.  Warrior leaders like Poundmaker and Big Bear who fought against the theft of their lands were some of the first inmates of Stony Mountain.  They were convicted and imprisoned for treason.

Until the 1960s it was illegal under Canadian law to serve liquor or alcoholic beverages of any kind to an Indian. Indians could not legally be in a beverage room or buy liquor from any off sale outlet. In most of the treaties First Nation leaders specifically asked for protection against alcohol. Following World War II where First Nation people made a significant contribution and earned the respect of their fellow soldiers, both the liquor law and the law which banned Indians from voting came under fire from veterans.

Indians literally went to town on the lifting of the liquor ban. Alcohol consumption became a symbol of victory for many First Nation veterans. With their veterans pension in their pocket, drinking with white soldiers who still held them in high esteem, they (with their many First Nation friends) filled the beer parlors.  Murders, violence, suicides, depression, and all social ills that come with alcohol abuse became evident in many First Nation communities. The justice system was seeing Indians in their courts in numbers never before seen and the courts responded with heavy sentences for First Nation people.

A 1970s survey of Stony Mountain inmates by the Indian Metis Brotherhood Organization found that 95% of First Nation inmates were either drunk or under the influence of drugs when they committed the crime for which they were serving time. It is significant to realize that only 5% of First Nation people in this penitentiary were legally sober at the time they committed their crime.  The vast majority of First Nation people who have been sober for years are never in conflict with the law, a very sobering fact.

With legalizing of liquor consumption for Indians in the 1960s came significant increases in marriage breakups and in many cases rampant child neglect. Demographically, this was the largest generation of children, the baby boomers, who were affected by the legalization and experimentation with liquor in First Nation communities. The parents in the 1960s and 1970s were the ones who grew up in residential school.  Here in Manitoba, residential schools were part of the childhood experience of First Nation children from the 1920s, to the late 1960s.  The First Nation generation that was allowed to legally drink in the bars were the children who had grown up in residential school. 

A combination of problems occurred.  A generation of residential school attendees who grew up with no parental role models was having children.  At the same time they were being introduced to alcohol for the first time. Governments responded to the child neglect on reserves with Childrens Aid societies.  Thousands of jobs in child care, foster homes, social work etc was the sign of the sixties and seventies.  Another generation of children was sent off reserve, this time to be adopted in white homes. This was the generation of the Manitoba Warriors.

A fallacy exists that First Nation inmates in Stony Mountain and in provincial jails are in thirty years old and up.  The reality is that the majority of First Nation inmates in prison and jails are young. The largest group would be in their late teens and early twenties. Many of these young people grow up in prison and many of them spent time in foster homes, adoptions, and experienced child neglect, even sexual abuse. After decades of being ignored (the 1960s to 1980s) First Nation inmates in Stony Mountain decided to form the Manitoba Warriors.

The idea was to be a group to help each other once they got out of prison, they even had the ideal to help their people.  As they got paroled, as they finished their time in prison and were let out on the streets they hit harsh reality. First Nation unemployment was 60 to 95%, and inmates were at the bottom of the list for jobs. Stony Mountain Penitentiary is not a rehabilitation facility, it is about restitution and punishment for criminal behavior.

Prison does not cure alcoholism or drug addiction. What is taught in prison is survival. Hundreds of prisoners locked up, sometimes for 23 hours a day. Time goes by slowly. For young men in the teens and twenties, it is not a place to learn healthy sexual attitudes. It is not where you graduate with a B.A. and then get rewarded with a good paying job.  What the Manitoba Warriors learned was that there were no jobs for them on the outside.  After months and sometimes years of being poor, doing societys lowest paid jobs, pushing broom, moping floors and seeing no future, easy money beckoned.

The 1980s and 1990s were the decades of the bloods, the crips and gang movies, like the hood. 1990 was the year of Oka and the year Mohawk Warriors made international news. Oka represents a psychological break for many First Nation people.  For many of the young men who grew up in jails, in prisons, here was the answer. The whiteman was to blame.  The whiteman was the one who locked the cell door on them.  The whiteman was the cause of their misery, their poverty. For a generation of children who grew up with child neglect, foster homes, adoption homes, youth centers and graduated to jail and prisons, the whiteman was the one to blame.

Some very angry Manitoba Warriors went into selling drugs. Some may have forced women into prostitution.  There were however many who genuinely wanted to help their people.  Brian Contois; the then president of the Manitoba Warriors was contacted by the Grand Chief of the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs Phil Fontaine.  The proposal was to get a recreational facility for north end children. To try and do preventative work, to keep the youth from the same mistakes that led the MWs to prison. When the media got hold of it, the response was explosive.  Millions of taxpayer dollars for a gang hangout; never!

A large generation of First Nation children are now between 4 years old and 18 years of age. This is the baby boomers echo births which occurred from 1980 to 1995 that was noted earlier. The oldest of this large generation are now being seen in adult courts. It can only get worse without concrete reasonable steps to counter the effects of decades of neglect. The large Winnipeg Police Association would have the general public believe that bigger budgets, more police, tougher courts, tougher judges, tougher laws, more prisons and maybe even the death penalty will help. Gun control is another much touted solution.

In November of 1998, a police action termed Operation Snow targeted up to fifty members of the Manitoba Warriors. A massive police sweep involving the Winnipeg police and the R.C.M.P rounded up nearly forty members of the Manitoba Warriors.  They were charged under various Criminal Code violations, however they were also charged under new legislation, the anti gang or outlaw criminal organization law.

As of July 10, 1999 not one of those Manitoba Warriors who were charged have been allowed bail. This would not look so bad if it were not for the fact that a similar sweep of Oriental drug dealers in Winnipeg were also recently charged and they were granted bail. A group of white people were recently charged with living off of prostitution and they were charged under the new criminal organization law.  They were arrested and got bail in the same day. Again this makes it look bad not only for judges but for the politicians who direct crown prosecutors in the province of Manitoba. There seems to be two sets of laws operating in Manitoba seemingly based on race.

The new criminal organization law as it is currently being applied in the case of the Manitoba Warriors is a violation of fundamental human rights and is inconsistent with the Canadian constitutional right to be considered innocent until proven guilty.  The way this new law is being enforced in Manitoba means that anyone who is charged with being a Manitoba Warrior can be held in jail without the crown being forced to prove its case. This however isnt anything new.      

Section 100 of the Indian Act used to provide that an Indian charged with a violation under the Indian Act was guilty until such time as he or she proved themselves innocent in a court of law.  This has since been repealed.  Section 141 of the Canadian Indian Act from 1927 to 1951 made it an offense for an Indian to be in the presence of lawyer.  Also the lawyer could be sent to jail for being in the presence of an Indian. It was an offense under section 141 to raise money to challenge the laws of Canada as it applied to Indians.