Title: Reies Tijerina | American activist | Britannica
Headings: Reies Tijerina
Reies Tijerina
American activist

Content: Tijerina was released on bond. On June 5, 1967, La Alianza members raided the local courthouse in Tierra Amarilla in an attempt to perform a citizen’s arrest of the local district attorney for violating their civil rights and thwarting the organizing efforts of the Tierra Amarilla grant heirs. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. Subscribe Now
After being arrested, tried, and acquitted for the Tierra Amarilla courthouse raid, Tijerina gained international attention and entered national civil rights politics, forming alliances with Black Power advocates and rising Chicano leaders and serving as the Latino leader of the 1968 Poor People’s Campaign. However, despite a defense of double jeopardy, Tijerina was sentenced to federal prison in La Tuna, Texas, in 1970 for his involvement in the courthouse raid and was later transferred to a mental hospital in Springfield, Missouri. La Alianza declined during his incarceration, and Tijerina was prohibited from holding any leadership position in the organization under the terms of his release in 1971. Although Tijerina continued to be involved with social justice, his religiously based ideals became increasingly anti-Semitic and alienated many of his supporters. Tijerina moved to central Mexico in 1994 after his New Mexico home burned in a fire; in 2006 he moved to El Paso, Texas. He published an autobiography, They Called Me “King Tiger”: