Narragansett Indians Randy Noka, left, Chief Sachem Matthew Thomas and Hiawatha Brown leave Providence County Superior Court yesterday after their sentencing.

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The Providence Journal / Steve Szydlowski

PROVIDENCE — After almost five years of litigation and hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal costs, two Narragansett Indian leaders walked out of Providence County Superior Court yesterday with potentially clean records after being sentenced for their roles in the 2003 smoke-shop raid.

For assaulting a state police trooper by grabbing him from behind, Judge Susan E. McGuirl yesterday ordered Chief Sachem Matthew Thomas to perform 150 hours of community service teaching public school students about the history and culture of his tribe.

But she agreed to file the case for one year, saying she recognized that a conviction could affect his ability to act as the tribe’s signatory in dealing with federal agencies. “I do not see the merit in punishing [Thomas] as chief sachem.”

Though Thomas was found guilty by a jury in April, filing the case means the conviction would be expunged from his record if he obeys the law in the coming year, said Michael J. Healey, spokesman for Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch.

In issuing the sentence, McGuirl scolded Thomas for his actions during the raid. “If you had told everybody to stop and back off, it would have happened,” McGuirl said. “You chose not to do that.”

It was very lucky, she said, that only one serious injury resulted from the raid, given the number of weapons carried by state and tribal police, the passions of the Narragansetts and the determination of state troopers.

After a six-week trial, a 12-member jury in April found Thomas and two other tribal members guilty of assaulting and scuffling with troopers. The jury cleared four other Narragansetts altogether and acquitted the seven tribal members on trial of 12 misdemeanor counts. Another charge was dismissed by the judge.

At Governor Carcieri’s orders, the state police executed a search warrant on July 14, 2003, to stop the Narragansetts from selling tax-free cigarettes on tribal land in Charlestown. The raid erupted into a melee as tribal members resisted troopers coming onto the land. Eight tribal members were arrested and at least eight people, including state troopers, were injured.

The state held off on prosecuting the criminal cases for more than three years as federal courts decided what jurisdiction the state has on the tribe’s 1,800 acres. The attorney general’s office resumed prosecution in fall 2006, after the U.S. Supreme Court let stand a ruling that the state can enforce its laws on the Narragansetts’ settlement lands. (Charges against a juvenile were dropped in Family Court.)

Extraordinary attempts were made to resolve the cases short of trial. In addition to McGuirl’s efforts to reach a plea deal, the state Supreme Court took the unprecedented step of trying to mediate the matter.

The state’s high court also made a key ruling that spared Carcieri from taking the stand, overruling a decision by McGuirl. Defense lawyers had wanted to question the governor about his orders that day.

McGuirl yesterday agreed to a filing for First Councilman Randy Noka, who the jury found guilty of disorderly conduct for swatting at troopers coming onto tribal land. She ordered him to perform 25 hours of community service teaching students about the tribe. Both Noka and Thomas have clean records.

Calling his crimes the most troubling and egregious of the incident, she gave Tribal Councilman Hiawatha Brown a one-year suspended sentence with probation for assaulting Trooper Ann Assumpico by slamming her arm in the shop door. He received a six-month suspended sentence with probation for disorderly conduct. He was ordered to undergo anger-management counseling.

“That was the most volatile, dangerous moment of all in that encounter,” she said. In 2004, Brown pleaded no contest to hitting a police officer in the jaw who had pulled him over for driving on a suspended license.

At the sentencing hearing moments earlier, defense lawyer William P. Devereaux asked for leniency, drawing on the tribe’s historically troubled relationship with the state.

“Isn’t it time for us, the State of Rhode Island, to step for forward and extend a hand to them?” he said.

He implored McGuirl to set interactions between the state and its only federally recognized Indian tribe on a different path: “Today is the day we can perhaps start going in a different direction.”

But Special Assistant Attorney General Pamela Chin asked that the three be held responsible for their actions that day, saying they had been spoiling for a fight.

“These are the tribal leaders, these are the people leading people, and they led them into a fight with state police,” said Chin.

For Thomas, the state asked for probation and community service. The state asked that Brown get a one-year suspended sentence with probation for the assault charge, and six months’ suspended with probation for the disorderly conduct. For Randy Noka, the state asked for six months’ probation with 25 hours of community service.

The three tribal members spoke on their own behalf, saying it was unclear at the time that state law applied on Narragansett land and that they regretted that day but were acting in the tribe’s best interests.

Brown said he would still be inclined to defend his people again.

“The laws of the tribe sit comparable to any other laws I accept,” said Brown, a stone mason.

Lynch issued this statement after the sentencing. “First, I don’t think we could have gone to greater lengths to ensure that the defendants were treated the same way as anybody else who was being prosecuted on the same charges,” he said. “Second, I don’t think that today’s sentencing negates the fact that a jury convicted these three defendants of crimes committed against State Troopers who had the legal authority to execute a search warrant of an illegal business. Third, as much as I question the appropriateness of the community-service component of Chief Sachem Thomas’s sentence, this case is over and its finality is good our state.”

Jeff Neal, spokesman for Carcieri, said the governor was pleased the criminal trial “resulting from this unfortunate incident is concluded.”

“He continues to support the actions of the Rhode Island State Police, as did the U.S. Supreme Court,” Neal said. “With this trial behind us, the governor hopes that we can now work to develop a more cooperative relationship between the state and the Tribe.”

State police Maj. Steven G. O’Donnell did not return a phone call seeking comment.

Several jurors said they were so angered by what they learned at trial that they plan to press the state’s congressional delegation to investigate the manner in which the state police executed the warrant, around midday with customers and children at the scene, and why no troopers faced assault charges.

One, John A. Cassidy III, of Cranston, said this week that he would pursue that effort once the sentencing was through.

Another, Janet Maddox, of Smithfield, attended yesterday’s sentencing.

“I just think the whole thing was very disturbing,” said Maddox, the single minority member of the jury. “They [the state police] were bullies and they were looking for a fight and it was the Narragansetts who paid the price.”

Thomas said outside the court that the tribe will seriously consider appealing McGuirl’s refusal on Tuesday to grant a new trial because of juror misconduct, including the accusation that one juror banged his water bottles like in a tom-tom-like beat as they were about to return their verdict.

“I just feel it’s offensive. I want it looked into,” he said.

Noka, whose wife, Bella, was one of those acquitted, said he remained troubled that only the tribe had been held accountable.

“In my mind there still are questions about how they came on that day,” he said. “Not just the tribe should be held culpable here.”

kmulvane@projo.com