LAS CRUCES, N.M. -- A member of the Mescalero Apache tribe in Southern New Mexico said he and his kids were dis-enrolled from the tribe because of a disagreement with a tribal council member.

After the tribal council told him he needed DNA evidence to re-enroll, it refuses to hear the results.

His adopted name is Thad Ponce, but he's known on the reservation as Denny Peralto, but either name he uses the tribal council wont acknowledge him.

DNA testing can put a suspected criminal in prison, but can it return a man and his family to their birthright?

“Having heard it today for the first time, the whole thing is pretty shocking,” said Stefan Long, general manager of the Genetic Testing Laboratories in Las Cruces.

Ponce said a confrontation started years ago when a council member asked sponsors to stop giving money to his son to compete in Tae Kwan Do.

“I guess it was because of jealousy,” said Ponce.

Finally he spoke up to a council member after a near-altercation.

“I did tell Freddy Chino you have no business in any kind of council seat or being vice president or president because you spent 10 years in the penitentiary." said Ponce.

Later, on the set of Steven Spielberg’s "Into the West" series, a makeup artist cut his daughter's hair so short that it stripped her customary womanhood.

A potential quarter-million dollar lawsuit went up in smoke, because the council threw him off the reservation via police escort.

“You need to leave the reservation, you're banned,” said Ponce.

Dropped off at the reservation line, Ponce was given 20 days to come up with DNA proof that he was related to a tribal member, but money was tight.

“I was out in the street for about three months. I started going from shelter to shelter in Roswell and Alamogordo. It came to a point were I started asking people for money because I was hungry,” Ponce said.

His ex-wife saved money for DNA testing, which matched him to a half-brother, but the council wouldn't hear his case. Another recent test was done with a half-sister.

“It's linear array mitochondrial DNA analysis. It's a screening technique for forensics,” Long said.

And it proves he belongs.

“The results were extremely conclusive that he was definitely of the same maternal lineage as his half-sister,” Long said.

“I feel it proves I was right all along and I think it proves that the tribe was wrong,” Ponce said.

Tribal members were expected to re-enroll Ponce this week, but at a meeting Tuesday, they said they would possibly hear his case at the next council meeting.

He said he hopes he can return home to the reservation soon, with his seven kids.