Source: The Denver Post

http://www.denverpost.com/Stories/0,1413,36~53~1778300,00.html

On November 20, 2003 The Denver Post reported, "A Native American medicine man can keep murder a secret, just as a priest or other member of the clergy can, a Durango lawyer argues in a case that could shape federal law. 'There is no question in my mind that a Native American spiritual leader should be accorded the same rights as other clergy,' said Walter Echo-Hawk, attorney and lobbyist with the Native American Rights Fund in Boulder. 'It would be highly ethnocentric, if not discriminatory, for the federal courts to fail to accord the same privilege to Native Americans.' In this instance, now before a U.S. District Court judge in Denver, defense attorney Robert Duthie says federal investigators pressured an Apache spiritual leader to reveal what an alleged murderer confessed to him. The FBI leveraged that information to obtain a videotaped confession from Carlos C. Herrera who has been indicted on a charge of second-degree murder in the death of his 40-year-old ex-lover, Duthie said."