FARGO, N.D. (AP) — A former federal prosecutor who handled such high-profile cases as the 1977 trial of Native American activist Leonard Peltier has died.
Lynn Crooks died on Sunday, the U.S. Attorney's Office for North Dakota announced. He was 83 years old.
Crooks was an assistant U.S. attorney from 1969 to 2002 and led the prosecution team at Peltier's trial in Fargo. Peltier was convicted in connection with the 1975 shooting of two FBI agents on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. He was sentenced to life in prison and was recently denied parole.
Crooks also charged Yorie Kahl and Scott Faul in connection with a fatal 1983 shooting near Medina, North Dakota, that left two federal marshals dead. Kahl was the son of Gordon Kahl, a member of the anti-government group Posse Comitatus, who was also involved in the shooting.
Crooks has served in a variety of roles throughout his career, including first assistant U.S. attorney and acting U.S. attorney. In 2000, he told the Associated Press that his calling was to be a federal prosecutor.
“If I had the opportunity to go back and change everything, I wouldn't change a thing,” Crooks said at the time. “I don't think there's a better job for a lawyer.”
In 2016, he supported a ballot initiative that would add crime victims' rights to the North Dakota Constitution.
North Dakota U.S. Attorney Mac Schneider issued a statement Monday praising Crooks.
“While North Dakota will remember Lynn as a prosecutor of challenging and consequential cases of national importance, his colleagues will remember him as a kind and generous man who was never too busy to help a friend or guide a young lawyer,” Schneider said.
He also praised Crooks as “possibly the greatest prosecutor in the history of North Dakota.”
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