Self-Styled Medicine Man Offers Bogus Enrollment Story-Date: 11:46 a.m. PST Sunday , August 31, 1997 Self-Styled Medicine Man Offers Bogus EnrollmentIndian Country Today, Rapid City, S.D. Knight-Ridder/Tribune Business News MARION, K.Y.--Sept. 1--Over the phone, Little Bear's voice sounds purely American Indian. The longer he talks, the clearer it becomes, his motives might not be so pristine. The self-declared medicine man, who lives in Marion, Kentucky, said he is Chiricahua Apache, but is listed as Caucasian on his birth certificate because white doctors were ordered to classify him as such. Not to worry. Mr. Little Bear has begun his own organization, United Tribes of America, to provide enrollment for others like himself who, through unfortunate circumstances of birth, are not official members of recognized tribes. ``United Tribes of America has grown like wildfire,'' Mr. Little Bear said. ``We have hundreds of members from different states -- people who didn't know their heritage and understand their treaty rights.'' One right that the group provides members is help in evading child support payments. Recently Jim Carter, an attorney in the Hopkinsville, Kentucky, public defender's office, received a call from a lawyer in a neighboring county asking for information about the Indian Child Welfare Act. ``There was a man in jail for back child support, and Mr. Little Bear went over there demanding that the matter be transferred to tribal court under ICWA,'' he said. ``He had an American Indian card from United Tribes of America,'' Mr. Carter said. Although it is unclear whether Mr. Little Bear serves as tribal judge, he is in charge of enrollment for United Tribes of America. For a $25 ``administrative fee,'' Mr. Little Bear told Indian Country Today, he will have BIA archives searched for a potential member's ancestors. If none turn up, enrollment will still be granted. ``We know who you are and you know in your heart who you are,'' Mr. Little Bear said. ``If you don't want to be counted with the white man, we will enroll you.'' Mr. Carter became suspicious of Mr. Little Bear, who set up residence in Western Kentucky four months ago, when he began raising money for a reverse walk along the Trail of Tears. Mr. Carter is a member of Kentucky's Trail of Tears Commission. According to a July 31 article in the Crittenden Press in Marion, Kentucky, the self-styled spiritual leader plans to begin the walk in Oklahoma and detour to Washington, D.C. There he will present demands that anti-tobacco legislation be repealed and that restrictions on peyote use be abolished. ``It is a religious tool,'' he said. ``I am here to reveal the truth about the Trail of Tears,'' he said in the Kentucky interview. ``People tried (the walk) before, but not in the spiritual sense.'' Mr. Little Bear, claiming to be a direct descendant of Geronimo, told Indian Country Today he was born in Arizona. He said, going by Eli Little Bear, he lived among his people until 1989 when he moved to Wisconsin to help open a casino. A spokeswoman for the enrollment office of New Mexico's Mescalero Apache Tribe, whose members were formerly known as Chiricahua Apaches, said she had never heard of Mr. Little Bear. ``Our people don't have names like that,'' she said. She said that her office has received several calls to check on a Morgan Eagle Bear. ``He's operating somewhere out East,'' she said. After Wisconsin, Mr. Little Bear moved to Michigan. ``I got involved with tribes all over the state,'' he said. He would not tell Indian Country Today where he had lived in Michigan. ``When I was there, I was given a small white buffalo calf skin by a breeder,'' he said. ``All the 11 tribes in Michigan recognize me as the keeper of the bundle and flames. They say I was chosen to renew the prophesies of the White Buffalo Calf Woman. I was drawn to Kentucky to do this.'' No officials from Michigan tribal organizations we contacted had heard of Mr. Little Bear. ``I am a medicine man,'' he said. ``I do healing with herbs and, yes, I do Sweat Lodge Ceremonies. I know they are Sioux, but they are the spiritual legacy of our people.'' ----- ON THE INTERNET: Visit Indian Country Today on the World Wide Web at http://www.indiancountry.com/ ----- (c) 1997, Indian Country Today, Rapid City, S.D. Distributed by Knight-Ridder/Tribune Business News. ------------------------------------------------------------