For the most part, there is little we can say for certainty regarding the justice systems of Pre-Columbian societies in the Great Lakes system. We can upstream the justice systems of the colonial era. Even then, we have statements recalling, in some cases, that different methods were used before the “current” system, so how far back the the justice systems of the 17th Century can be pushed back becomes debatable.

Here I’ll focus on the Wendat (the Huron Confederacy, roughly between Georgian Bay and Lake Ontario in the early half of the 1600s).The Wendat recognized four major crimes: murder , theft, “witchcraft,” and treason. All violent crimes were investigated by the council with the appropriate jurisdiction.

Murder: When a murder occurred within the Wendat community, under pre-confederacy system, the victim’s clan (maternal relations) were obliged to seek vengeance against the murderer or the murderer’s clan. However, by the time the French arrived, pursuing a blood feud was regarded as a worse crime than the original murder and should the victim’s clan succeed in taking a life to avenge the one they lost, they bore the responsibility for the new murder and the original offending clan was absolved.

Instead murder was atoned through reparations paid by the murderer’s clan to the victim’s clan. The victim’s clan dispatched a bundle of sticks to signify the number presents they deemed necessary, and these in turn were distributed among the murderer’s clan so as necessary to fulfill the demand. Each present was supposed to the equivalent value of a beaver robe. The higher the victim’s social standing, the greater the number of reparations demanded. On average, thirty gifts were necessary for a male victim, and forty for a female victim. The gifts were presented the victim’s clan in a formal ceremony. Another old tradition that was no longer in practice by the time the French arrived was to force the murderer to sit beneath the victim’s burial scaffold while the body decomposed above him, until he and clan paid the necessary reparations. At the end of the ceremony, the victim’s family offered some smaller gifts to the murderer’s family as a sign of their forgiveness and the matter was considered resolved between them. Of course, the murderer still had to deal with the potential ire and resentment of his own clan and could be deprived of their future support and assistance if he committed any crimes in the future. Maiming or otherwise seriously injuring another person was treated similarly, though the number of presents needed for reparations was considerably less.

Theft: The Wendat at this time had a very narrow definition of theft, which essentially only included items taken from a home without the owner’s permission or forcibly taken from a person. Something left outside unattended was, legally speaking, fair game. If a victim of theft recognized their belongings in the possession of another person, they had to ask the current owner where they had acquired it. Refusing to answer the question was seen as an admission of guilt. If the current owner said they had gotten the item from someone else, the victim questioned that person, and so on, until the original thief could be identified. Once the thief had been found, the victim and his relatives were allowed to go to the thief’s longhouse and take whatever they desired.

Witchcraft: Both men and women could be accused of witchcraft - the use of spiritual power to inflict harm on others. Usually this harm took the form of a sudden and inexplicable illness or death, particularly of an otherwise healthy and prosperous individual (since jealousy was the primary vice that caused people to resort to witchcraft). If sickness did not respond to the usual healing arts, witchcraft was suspected and a specialist known as an aretsan was called in for aid. The supernatural illness was thought to have been caused by a sorcerous charm slipped into the victim’s body with the flesh of an angont, one of the horned serpents. The aretsan’s responsibility was to draw the charm out of the victim. Once the charm had been extracted, it was deemed as proof that witchcraft had been involved. Even absent such proof, the victim’s dreams, rumors, and suspicious behavior might draw accusations of witchcraft. Suspicious behavior included an assortment of anti-social behavior that deviated from the expected norms of Wendat society: speaking harshly to others, refusing to contribute to feasts or otherwise be generous, seeking undue privacy (being found alone in the woods without a reason, for example), and recurrent criminal activity. A witch’s life was forfeit, though in practice only the leaders of the community could sanction the accused witch’s death. If anyone else killed a person they suspected of being a witch without the backing of the community, then they’d end up being treated as a murderer themselves. An accusation of witchcraft would generally be brought to a council in secret, and if the council supported the accusation, an executioner might be appointed to carry out the sentence without warning. In other situations, the witch might be captured and tortured in hopes that he or she will reveal any accomplices. As a last alternative, the witch might be publicly executed as a prisoner-of-war.

Treason: Anyone who had close dealings with enemy nations were monitored and should it appear that they intended to divulge national secrets or otherwise endanger the security of the confederacy, a council could order their death. Such executions were made to appear as though the traitor had been killed by the very enemy he meant to betray the Wendat to. Since the council that sanctioned the traitor’s death carried out any further investigation, they could quietly sweep the matter aside without further inquiry.