Judge: Navajo lawsuit over human remains premature

FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (AP) — A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit that sought to have human remains exhumed from Canyon de Chelly on the Navajo reservation returned to the tribe.

The Navajo Nation contended in a 2011 lawsuit that hundreds of sets of human remains and associated funerary objects taken from the national monument near Chinle are tribal property. Despite demands for the remains, the National Park Service has unrightfully held them in a collection in Tucson, the lawsuit stated.