Ailing, 79-year-old Native American activist Leonard Peltier denied parole request

July 2 (UPI) -- Leonard Peltier, a Native American activist imprisoned for nearly 50 years, on Tuesday was denied parole, prompting Amnesty International to call on U.S. President Joe Biden to grant clemency to the ailing 79-year-old.

Because of his age and the next scheduled full hearing on parole not being until 2039, Tuesday's development could mean Peltier, considered by many to be the longest serving political prisoner in the United States, will remain incarcerated until his death unless he gets clemency.

To keep Peltier locked behind bars was called "a human rights travesty," Amnesty International said Tuesday in response to the U.S. Parole Commission's denial of Peltier's parole request after a June 10 hearing.

An activist for Native American and indigenous peoples in the American Indian Movement still serving two life terms for murder, Peltier has been considered a "political prisoner" by groups such as Amnesty International since his lockup decades ago after what many called a questionable trial.

"No one should be imprisoned after a trial riddled with uncertainty about its fairness," Amnesty USA's Executive Director Paul O'Brien said Tuesday . "We are now calling on President Biden, once again, to grant Leonard Peltier clemency on humanitarian grounds and as a matter of mercy and justice."

While the White House has so far stayed silent on the topic, a unanimous 2022 Democratic National Committee resolution urged Biden to release Peltier joined by dozens of members of Congress in both the Senate and House chambers, along with Sen. Bernie Sanders , I-Vt. and the Senate's Indian Affairs Committee chairman, Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii.

Peltier, convicted in the 1975 murders of two FBI agents -- Jack Coler and Ron Williams -- on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota, in 2004 asked a judge to release files he believes would grant him a new trial, contending that he was framed by the U.S. government and that he would be exonerated if certain documents were publicly released.

"Today is a sad day for Indigenous Peoples and justice everywhere. The U.S. Parole Commission's denial of parole for Leonard Peltier, America's longest serving Indigenous political prisoner, is a travesty," Nick Tilsen, president and CEO of NDN Collective, said Tuesday .

His trial was widely viewed to be riddled with alleged FBI or other judicial misconduct in the fight to convict Peltier. The FBI Agents Association "strongly opposed" Peltier's release as Peltier has since maintained his innocence.

Peltier "has been afforded his rights and due process time and again, and repeatedly, the weight of the evidence has supported his conviction and his life sentence," FBI Director Christopher Wray said Tuesday praising the Parole Commission decision.

"Not only are there ongoing, unresolved concerns about the fairness of his trial, he has spent nearly 50 years in prison, is approaching 80 years old, and suffers from several chronic health problems," said O'Brien.

Currently housed in a Florida maximum security prison in regular lockdown, Peltier reportedly requires a walker to move and is blind in one eye from a previous stroke. In 1985, he alleged mistreatment while in federal prison.

Ahead of the June 10's hearing, Peltier's lawyer Kevin Sharp did acknowledge how the parole request was "probably his last chance" to be freed. An interim parole status hearing is set for 2026 with full hearing slated for 2039 when Peltier would be 94-years-old, he said Tuesday.

In a letter last month urging the parole commission to act, Amnesty, which has been involved with Peltier's case since 1977, reiterated its concern about the legal process which ultimately led to Peltier's conviction and sentencing, citing his age, length of time served and "critical health issues," such as diabetes and an aortic aneurysm.

"Given the ongoing, unresolved concerns about the fairness of Leonard Peltier's incarceration," O'Brien wrote ahead of the June 10 parole hearing, "that he has spent nearly 50 years in prison, his age, and ongoing and chronic health issues, granting parole on humanitarian grounds in this case is not only timely but a necessary measure in the interests of both justice and mercy."

The last time Peltier was denied presidential immunity was 2009 when former President George W. Bush on his way out of office had refused to grant Peltier a clemency request in a series of others issued on Bush's exit from the White House.

A Missouri inmate testifying in a 1985 transfer hearing at the Medical Center for Federal Prisoners claimed a federal prison official had asked him to kill Peltier , saying how two men approached Robert Hugh Wilson in May 1978 at their Illinois federal prison with a deal that if he murdered Peltier, in return Wilson would receive immediate medical treatment and seven detainers against him would be dropped.