The Case of the Indian Trader
Billy Malone and the National Park Service Investigation at Hubbell Trading Post
Paul D. Berkowitz
University of New Mexico Press
Albuquerque
ISBN for this digital edition: 978-0-8263-4861-6
2011 by Paul D. Berkowitz
All rights reserved. Published 2011
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Berkowitz, Paul (Paul D.)
The case of the Indian trader : Billy Malone and the National Park Service investigation at Hubbell Trading Post / Paul D. Berkowitz.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8263-4859-3 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Malone, Billy Gene. 2. Hubbell Trading Post National Historic Site (Ganado, Ariz.)History20th century. 3. Indian tradersArizonaBiography. 4. Berkowitz, Paul (Paul D.) 5. Criminal investigationsArizonaCase studies. 6. False arrestArizonaCase studies. 7. United States. National Park ServiceHistory20th century. 8. Western National Parks AssociationHistory20th century. 9. Navajo Indian ReservationHistory20th century. 10. Navajo IndiansArizonaSocial life and customs20th century. I. Title.
F819.G36B37 2011
979.137dc22
2010051227
For Billy Malone and his family
To help set things right
and
For Susan Morton
Who wanted this story to be told
Foreword
This book will shatter many illusions about the National Park Service.
This is not another book written by a retired park ranger about his or her exploits in the service. You will not find any romantic or humorous accounts of life as a ranger spent in the great outdoors, engaging tourists, protecting wildlife, or saving lives. And this is certainly not a story told in any of the popular public television documentaries about the unique system of national parks that author and historian Wallace Stegner famously referred to as Americas best idea.
This book tells a different story, providing a rare and intimate glimpse into the inner workings and the culturewarts and allof Americas most beloved federal agency. That is all the more reason why this is an important booka book that needed to be written and a book that should be read and studied by anyone who has visited and fallen in love with Americas national parks. This is the disturbing and all-too-real story behind the scenery of the NPS that uses its 2004 criminal investigation at Hubbell Trading Post as a case study to shed light on the dark side of how the agency operates behind the scenes, often self-destructively and at the expense of its very mission.
The Indian trader in this story is Billy Malone, by most accounts a gentle and generous soul who spent almost his entire life living among the Navajo Indians in far northeastern Arizona, working as a real, old-time Indian trader in the most remote regions of the reservation. Malone was the last of a breed: the last genuine Indian trader to work at Hubbell Trading Post NHS. Billy Malone is the focal point in this story, the unfortunate individual around whom the investigation spun out of control. But while Billy Malone is at the center of the story, a bigger picture unfolds in the detailed account of how Malone was falsely accused of a host of crimes and then recklessly pursued and nearly railroaded to destruction through a criminal investigation undertaken by the NPS in partnership with the nonprofit, cooperating association known as the Western National Parks Association. Along the way, officials from a number of other government agencies jumped into the fray, contributing to the damage and destruction by attempting to cover up what had happened and by trying to strip Malone of what few rights had not already been trampled. It is this account that will shatter your illusions and expose the myths about not only the NPS but the other agencies and organizations with which it is allied.
As a retired NPS special agent, Paul Berkowitz is uniquely qualified to tell this story. There was probably no one else in the NPS who would have dared to tell it. With more than thirty-three years of law enforcement experience under his belt, most of it working in the field as a supervisory special agent, Berkowitz has seen more than his fair share of conflict and corruption in the NPS. He spent a career as one of a small group whose sole responsibility is the investigation of serious crimes committed in the national parks. His integrity and his commitment to his constitutional oath of office long ago earned him a reputation as a troublemaker in the agency, a brand he wears as a badge of honor. It was only through his efforts, his resolve, and his bold intervention in the Hubbell investigation that a light was shed on the egregious mishandling that had occurred in the early stages of the investigation and the misconduct that had taken place at the highest levels of his agency. Those efforts put Berkowitz on a collision course with his own supervisors and other senior officials in the agency who, after spending nearly a million dollars and nearly two years targeting the Indian trader, simply wanted to see Malone arrested for somethingfor anything and then have the matter go away. But that was not something Berkowitz could abide. After finishing his own investigation, he turned everything around by handing off the case to internal investigators from the Office of the Inspector General. It is Berkowitz, more than any other person, who knows the details of this story and the disturbing, misguided manner in which the NPS at times operates. Were it not for his actions, this story would have had a different and far more tragic ending. That is all the more reason this is Berkowitzs story to tell.
Berkowitz and I met in the early 1980s at a seminar I was conducting for the NPS. At that time, I was the supervisor of the Behavioral Sciences Unit and Hostage Negotiations Team for the second largest sheriffs department in Arizona. After my own retirement I went into private practice, consulting and providing training and crisis services as a contract police psychologist for state, local, provincial, and federal law enforcement agencies across the United States, Canada, and Europe. The NPS was one of my clients for much of that time. Years spent providing training and counseling services to NPS emergency services personnel gave me the opportunity to observe firsthand what an unusual and often conflicted organization it really is, particularly in its ambivalent approach to law enforcement, having its own unique way of doing business beyond public view.
Berkowitz describes the culture of the agency and takes the reader through the history of how the NPS has evolved into an atypical bureaucracy, unique in all of government for both its idealistic mission and for the image it has cultivated with the American public. But that culture and public image has left the agency vulnerable to abuse by ambitious and unscrupulous employees, supervisors, and managersincluding law enforcement personnelwhose own influence and raw political power has enabled them to operate with alarming levels of autonomy and freedom from meaningful oversight and accountability.
Most Americans have grown accustomed to hearing about scandal and corruption in government. But few people are aware or would even consider the extent to which those same types of problems exist in the NPS. In his account, Berkowitz for the first time exposes, probes, and discusses the unique culture of the servicehow it operates, and how it thinks. In telling that part of the story, Berkowitz is breaking new ground, exploring new territory, and distinguishing himself as a thoughtful, analytical writer. Berkowitz has done an extraordinary job of describing and explaining many of the strange characteristics I personally witnessed as a consultant to the NPS but had not fully understood. In so doing, Berkowitz has done more than simply write an expos and tell a fascinating story. He has made a significant contribution to the literature dealing with organizational psychology and corruption.
