A leading researcher on Indigenous identity fraud has been ordered to pay damages and legal fees in a defamation suit filed by a University of Regina academic.
Plaintiff Michelle Coupal says Darryl Leroux defamed her when publicly stating she used a false Indigenous identity to become an expert in reconciliation.
According to the decision, Coupal began identifying as Indigenous in 2010, based on a belief that she had an Algonquin ancestor from the early 1800s. She was initially accepted by the Algonquin nation.
In 2018, she was appointed Canada Research Chair in Truth and Reconciliation and Indigenous Literatures.
In a 2023 purge, the Algonquin Nation removed Thomas Legarde from their root ancestor list, saying the man was French and wrongly identified as Algonquin. Coupal and more than a thousand others lost him as their link to the nation.
In his March 11 ruling, Judge D.E. Labach found Coupal didn’t maliciously claim indigeneity — she believed it to be true.
Coupal declined to be interviewed. Her lawyer, Paul Harasen, said in a statement, “Leroux was not found liable because of his statements that (Coupal) isn’t Indigenous. He was found liable because he went much further and repeatedly stated that she committed fraud. Those are two very different things.”
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Leroux also declined to be interview. His lawyer, Yavar Hameed, said in a statement, “the court’s decision did not focus on the evidence of whether Coupal is an Indigenous person. Instead, it based its conclusions on whether the plaintiff subjectively felt that she was Métis, and then later Algonquin, at various points in time in her academic career, based on things she understood or was told,” adding, “the public discourse around the appropriation of Indigenous identity by non-Indigenous people is important and Leroux plans to appeal the ruling.”
Veldon Coburn is a citizen of the Algonquins of Pikwàkanagàn First Nation and a professor whose research focuses on Indigenous identity politics, Canadian–Indigenous relations and settler colonialism.
“There is a lot to be left desired in terms of the court’s relationship with understanding Indigenous peoples,” says Coburn, who filed an affidavit for the defence and has worked alongside Leroux.
“I wouldn’t invest a lot political capital into this particular decision. A higher court can rule on the law of it.”
Michelle Good is a retired lawyer from Red Pheasant Cree Nation who says non-Indigenous people working in Indigenous roles without lived experience as an Indigenous person is harmful.
“Large numbers of people are trying identify themselves as Indian bands to be able to participate in treaty discussions that are beneficial to them and them alone,” says Good.
“It threatens to, in effect, remove the basic meaning of indigeneity. It’s another form of assimilation.”
She says an appeal of the ruling is possible but not easy.
“What you need to find is an error of law or an error in fact,” Good says.
She along with many top scholars are currently working on a book called The Pretendian Compendium; The Complex Phenomenon of Indigenous Identity Fraud, set to be released in 2027.
Leroux has testified as an expert in Indigenous identity fraud before the Standing Committee on Indigenous and Northern Affairs and authored Distorted Descent, exploring the phenomenon of white people race-shifting to a self-defined Indigenous identity.
She’s not an expert, nor did she prove her LINEAGE!!! COUPAL IS NOT INDIGENOUS, SHES PHONY.
It is wild that we give such meaning to genetic heritage. Let’s just all be Canadians. Same rules, same treatment. Same rights. If we did this all this nonsense would disappear.
I’m also a indigenous program Creator as of 2017-18 UBC for DT Vancouver . I’ve been working in the community for 25.3 years. Also I research was inducted into the Vancouver public Library special collection section in 2023
I just want to say thank you for doing something right. For standing your ground and your heritage kudos!
Another issue that needs to be addressed is the teaching of the dislike of the “colonizers” .. of which most FN now have in their genetic makeup .. thus teaching them to dislike themselves !!
Try This
James stop being a clown….
@Curlsonbottom
Lolololol these people need to go back to where ever they came from..
Curls…. Have you ever Interneted before? Cuz you seem real confused.
Global you need to close the comments on stories like this. If you’re not going to require people to identify who they are, it’s inappropriate.
Biased much Melissa? Did you fact check this time or did you just run with the story?
Fraud pays better if you say I’m indigenous
Fraud
I’ve known several Caucasian Canadians in the past who have strived to be able to capitalize on an indigenous affiliation merely for the tax benefits.
I could tell right away she’s indigenous. It’s her hair.
Indians are disgusting. Shut your vile holes. Quit begging for money.
We are all descents of Noah so we are all related.
When they are blond and blue eyed, it is very difficult to understand why they would believe they are native.
We need to get the genealogy straight. Every couple of years Canada changes the rules, based on who is currently complaining about them being unfair.
We need to make it simple. Your native ancestor (the one you believe makes you native) should be only 2 generations away. So thinking an ancestor that might have been native, from 1800’s is way to old to be considered as a source of being native.
One of the rules was that the ancestor had to be great grandparent or newer. That is a great limitation, and easy to test for.
I have seen grandparents fighting for their grandkids to be status because their own great grandparents were native. – it has to end somewhere.
What’s the difference between the false claim of mass graves, and equally false claim of being indigenous?
Hint:
320 million vs. 70 thousand.
Which lie pays better?