Kahn-Tineta Horn can’t get a break. Hounded for four years by the courts and the SQ, the Mohawk traditionalist now has to go to court again to defend herself against charges of obstructing and assaulting two SQ officers.
Horn was acquitted of the charges May 25, but the Crown has decided to appeal.
Horn, who ran for Grand Chief in the recent Kahnawake election, was active behind the Mohawk barricades at Kanehsatake in the summer of 1990. Indian Affairs tried unsuccessfully to fire her from her job in the civil service after the Oka Crisis. For a time, Horn also lost custody of her children, and she has been a target of SQ harassment.
The latest charges were laid on January 21 of this year after a dispute with SQ officers just outside the Mohawk Territory of Kahnawake. The officers tried to place Horn under arrest after discovering she had an outstanding parking ticket.
According to a report in The Eastern Door, one of the officers grabbed Horn by the arm and twisted her wrists. He received a blow to the face. After a brief scuffle, Horn was finally handcuffed, but not before she managed to kick the other officer in the leg. Horn, 54, claims that later on at the SQ station she was badly beaten and had to be taken to a local hospital.
Horn’s lawyer argued that the police acted excessively when they imprisoned her for an unpaid parking ticket Since she was wrongfully arrested, he argued that Horn was entitled to de fend herself. “I had enough money on me to pay the ticket but they refused to take it,” Horn told The Eastern Door.
