The Gunslinger

On June 5, 1967, Reies López Tijerina led what became known as the Tierra Amarilla Courthouse Raid. That day, he and a few armed companions sought to conduct a citizen’s arrest of the local district attorney, Alfonso Sánchez, who they thought was in his office in the county courthouse in Tierra Amarilla, New Mexico. Members of the Alianza Federal de Mercedes hoped to call attention to the long history of land dispossession in the region by arresting Sánchez. But Sánchez was not even in the building. Raiders shot one man, physically assaulted two, and kidnapped two more, a succession of events that, along with the raid itself, resulted in costly legal battles. Tijerina, however, emerged as the singular hero, an inspiration to young Chicano movement participants.