Ex-Stone Child president faces more charges

Former Stone Child College President Melody Henry faces more theft charges that could bring her an additional 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

Those charges were opened on Tuesday when she appeared in federal court in Great Falls. She and her husband, Frank Gregory Henry, Stone Child’s facilities manager, pleaded not guilty to other charges in September.

The new charges are theft from an Indian tribal government receiving federal funding and theft from an Indian tribal organization. Details of the most recent charges were not available.

At her arraignment, a Feb. 2 trial date was set on the new charges.

The earlier charges contend that Henry paid $530,242 in college funds to Hunter Burns Construction Co., and then received $242,273 back from the company in 2012.

Burns has pleaded guilty to similar charges involving other tribal officials.

Henry was also charged with buying an electrical generator with college funds and using it for herself.

The Henry charges are part of a continuing scandal on Rocky Boy’s Indian Reservation. Several people — people on the reservation and their off-reservation cohorts — have been charged with various forms of theft of government funds.

Henry served as president of Stone Child, the two-year college at Rocky Boy, for several years before abruptly resigning in May 2013. She said she wanted to spend more time with her family.

She faces 25 years in jail for the charges filed in September.