The defendants call the permit system discriminatory and ineffective, saying that the government's restrictions go beyond what is necessary to protect eagles and preserve Native American culture. They predict that the black market will grow under current policies.
One measure of the rising demand, they say, is the fact that the repository's waiting list, now as long as five years, was only a few months a decade ago.
Hardman was using a bundle of feathers to purify his truck after transporting a relative's body to a funeral. At the time, he had a wife and two children with Certificates of Indian Birth, and they regularly took part in religious ceremonies together. When he was given a feather bundle by a Hopi practitioner in Arizona, he promptly called the Fish and Wildlife Service to get a possession permit.
He was told he was ineligible because of his bloodline. Though his wife and children had Certificates of Indian Birth and he was an accepted practitioner of American Indian religion, he was not a member of a tribe.
"They told me not to even bother -- that the best thing for me to do would be to turn over my feathers to the authorities," Hardman said. Instead, he hung the feathers from the rear-view mirror of his Ford pickup.
They stayed there until 1996, when his wife left him and turned him in to tribal police.
Hardman is angry at being prosecuted because, he said, some Native Americans trap, trade and sell eagle feathers. They don't get caught, he said, because police never check permits.
"If you are buying or selling eagle parts, the likelihood of being detected is slim to none," said Jojola, the Fish and Wildlife agent.
Hardman said police should check Native Americans' permits, but Native American practitioners consider that idea offensive.
"It's the same as having to have a permit to carry a cross," said Ron Rader, a powwow dancer in Sacramento whose regalia includes the wings and wing feathers of several golden eagles.
But Native Americans warn that allowing non-Indians to possess feathers because they practice Indian religions would create new demand for black-market feathers and spur an increase in poaching.
Edward Wemytewa, a tribal council member at Zuni Pueblo, a 500-year-old settlement in New Mexico, wrote in an affidavit for the prosecution, "Today, there are very few places left on Zuni lands where eagles still live in the wild. Additional demand for eagle feathers would have a detrimental effect on the Zuni way of life."
Though practitioners condemn killing or selling eagles, wildlife police, eagle biologists and Native American leaders agree that such a black market exists.
In 2000, one bald eagle and two golden eagles were killed and stolen from the Santa Barbara Zoo; authorities believe the birds were targeted for their feathers.
In an affidavit in the Utah case, Fish and Wildlife Special Agent Kevin Ellis wrote that the black-market price for a whole golden eagle carcass was about $1,200, a price that has tripled since the 1980s.
"It's a problem of supply and demand," said Cindy Schroeder, who retired last year from the Fish and Wildlife law enforcement division. "Every additional dancer or worshipper is more demand. The supply is flying around in the air."
