The repatriation represented the appropriate application of the principles embedded in NAGPRA: that Native American human remains and associated cultural items held by federal agencies and federally funded institutions must be inventoried, that affiliated tribes must be notified and consulted, and that the remains must be returned upon tribal request.

The cultural affiliation question — which is central to any NAGPRA repatriation — was determined in favor of the Chumash connection to the Channel Islands.

While the specific biological ancestry of the Arlington Springs individual cannot be established by the available science, the long-established connection of Chumash people to the Northern Channel Islands and the Santa Barbara Channel region, documented archaeologically and historically over thousands of years, was sufficient to establish the cultural affiliation required by law.

The repatriation was not a scientific loss.