Native American curator sues Chicago Blackhawks professional hockey team for fraud, sexual harassment

A curator who was hired by the Chicago Blackhawks ice-hockey team to improve the organisation’s relationship with the Native American community is suing the team, alleging she was a victim of fraud, breach of contract and sexual harassment. The lawsuit was filed in Cook County, Illinois, last week on behalf of Nina Sanders, an Apsáalooke curator and writer who specialises in Native American art and is a beadwork artist herself. Sanders is seeking more than $150,000 and a jury trial.

According to the lawsuit, the Chicago Blackhawks had hired Sanders as a consultant in September 2020 amid backlash over their team name. The Washington Commanders had recently announced they would retire their previous name after decades of protest from Native American groups, in the thick of momentum driven by anti-racism protests that year. Earlier in 2020, Sanders had curated a show at Chicago’s Field Museum called Apsáalooke Women and Warriors, the museum’s first large-scale exhibition curated by a Native American scholar in collaboration with their community, according to the museum.

The Blackhawks are named after the US’s 86th Infantry Division, an army unit that fought in the First and Second World Wars. The unit was nicknamed the Blackhawk Division after Black Hawk, (born Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kiak), a 19th-century leader of the Sauk tribe born in what is now Illinois. Black Hawk defended his people and lands against white settlers.

Sanders says in the lawsuit that she was reluctant to work for the hockey team, because the Native American community is largely opposed to the use of Indigenous names, logos and imagery for sports teams. Advocacy groups widely say the practice is dehumanising and promotes negative stereotypes about Indigenous people being “savages”.

Sanders’ lawsuit states that Chicago Blackhawks chief executive Danny Wirtz vowed to fulfill a number of promises in exchange for her work, including creating full-time job positions for Native Americans, educating the organisation’s employees on Black Hawk and Native American history and issues, creating opportunities for Native American artists in merchandising and dedicating resources to purchasing land in Illinois to give back to the Sac and Fox Nation. Wirtz also, according to the lawsuit, promised Sanders he would advocate for and change the name and logo of the team.

The lawsuit accuses Wirtz of failing to follow through on those promises, instead using the organisation’s association with Sanders to “pacify resistance” to the Chicago Blackhawks’ use of Native American imagery for the team’s “continued economic benefit”.

In addition, Sanders has accused the team of failing to investigate her reports of sexual misconduct. She informed the organisation of multiple instances of sexual harassment, none of which were addressed in a meaningful capacity or reported to police, according to the lawsuit. Sanders says she was subjected to “inappropriate sexual advances” by someone with ties to the Blackhawks, including unwanted touching and flirting. This person tried to grab Sanders and force her into his hotel room and, months later, sent Sanders an explicit video of himself, according to the lawsuit.

Another Blackhawks employee was allegedly sexually assaulted by someone with ties to the team. That person was allowed to continue working with the team even after being reported by both the alleged victim and Sanders, the lawsuit states. Sanders says that in November 2022, a female guest in a suite at a Blackhawks game was harassed and groped by a Blackhawks dancer who had previously raped the woman. After Sanders brought these incidents to her supervisors’ attention, she said the organisation tried to change her role and move her away from the team’s United Center location in Chicago. During contract negotiations in June 2023, Sanders sent a timeline of the alleged workplace harassment and discriminatory behavior and asked how the organisation would address the issues, according to the lawsuit. About a week later, she says she was informed that while the team would continue a review of the accusations, she would no longer be working with the organisation.

A representative for the Chicago Blackhawks did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Blackhawks told The New York Times that the team “noted operational issues in her work, and had received feedback from external partners that they did not want to continue to work with her”. The Blackhawks say Sanders made her claims only after failing to negotiate a new contract, according to the Times. After investigating the allegations, they “found insufficient evidence to substantiate her claims”, the team said, adding that people identified by Sanders had never been employed by the Blackhawks.