Anxious to prove his case in court, Payne and a larger group returned to Ewing in July 1879. The Army again arrested the party, escorted them back to Kansas, and freed them. This time, however, Payne was charged under the Indian Intercourse Act and brought to trial in Fort Smith, Arkansas in March 1881. Judge Isaac Parker ruled against Payne and fined him the maximum amount of US$1,000, but since Payne had no money and no property, the fine could not be collected. The ruling settled nothing about the public lands, however, and Payne continued his activities unabated. He organized and led several more expeditions into the territory, even forming a newspaper called the "Oklahoma War Chief", the first in the Cherokee Outlet, which he published in several sites along the Kansas-Indian Territory border.