Oklahoma officials heard talking about killing journalists

Protesters holding signs demanding the resignation of Oklahoma county officials

By KEN MILLER and SEAN MURPHY

Associated Press

April 18, 2023 Updated 4:55 PM PT

An Oklahoma sheriff’s office says a newspaper’s audio recording in which the sheriff and other county officials are reportedly heard discussing killing two journalists and hanging Black people was illegal and predicted felony charges will be filed.

A post on the sheriff’s office Facebook page — the agency’s first public comment since the remarks by Sheriff Kevin Clardy and others were reported by the McCurtain Gazette-News — does not address the recorded discussion, but calls the situation “complex” and one “we regret having to address.”

The threatening comments by the officials in the recording have sparked outrage and protests. GOP Gov. Kevin Stitt and state Rep. Eddy Dempsey, a Republican who represents the area, have called for Clardy and others to resign. NAACP leaders in Oklahoma called for the FBI and the Justice Department to investigate.

The sheriff’s statement calls the last 72 hours “amongst the most difficult and disruptive in recent memory” and says the recording was altered and involves many victims.

“There is and has been an ongoing investigation into multiple, significant violation(s) of the Oklahoma Security of Communications Act ... which states that it is illegal to secretly record a conversation in which you are not involved and do not have the consent of at least one of the involved parties,” according to the statement.

Joey Senat, a journalism professor at Oklahoma State University, said that under state law, the recording would be legal if it were obtained in a place where the officials being recorded did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy.

Bruce Willingham, the longtime publisher of the McCurtain Gazette-News, said the recording was made March 6 when he left a voice-activated recorder inside the room after a county commissioners’ meeting because he suspected the group was continuing to conduct county business after the meeting had ended, in violation of the state’s Open Meeting Act.

Willingham said he twice spoke with his attorneys to be sure he was doing nothing illegal.

The newspaper released portions of the recording in which Clardy, sheriff’s Capt. Alicia Manning and District 2 County Commissioner Mark Jennings appear to discuss Willingham and son Chris, who is a reporter for the newspaper. Jennings tells Clardy and Manning that “I know where two deep holes are dug if you ever need them,” and the sheriff responded, “I’ve got an excavator.”

Jennings also reportedly said he’s known “two or three hit men” in Louisiana, adding that “they’re very quiet guys.”

In the recording, Jennings also appears to complain about not being able to hang Black people, saying: “They got more rights than we got.”

Jail Administrator Larry Hendrix also was present during the conversation.

The Associated Press could not immediately verify the authenticity of the recording. None of the four returned the AP’s telephone calls or emails. .

Glenn Cook, the executive editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, whose reporter Jeff German was stabbed to death in September, said he was “chilled to the bone” after learning about the Oklahoma case.

“What’s almost as troubling as the contents of the recording is the complete absence of shame,” Cook said of the sheriff’s office’s response to the incident. “Sadly, the willingness of government to protect itself at all costs really never surprises me, but in this particular case the kind of digging in that we’re seeing reflects incredibly poorly on the people of Oklahoma.”

A spokesperson for the FBI’s office in Oklahoma City declined to comment on the case. Phil Bacharach, a spokesperson for Oklahoma Atty. Gen. Gentner Drummond, said the agency had received an audio recording and is investigating the incident, but declined to comment further.

Willingham, the publisher, said he believes the local officials were upset about “stories we’ve run that cast the sheriff’s office in an unfavorable light,” including the death of Bobby Barrick, a Broken Bow, Okla., man who died at a hospital in March 2022 after McCurtain County deputies shot him with a stun gun. The newspaper has filed a lawsuit against the sheriff’s office seeking body camera recordings and other data connected to Barrick’s death.

Separately, Chris Willingham has filed a federal lawsuit against the sheriff’s office, Clardy, Manning and the Board of County Commissioners, alleging Manning slandered him after he wrote a series of articles detailing problems inside the sheriff’s office. The lawsuit alleges Clardy, the board and the sheriff’s office did not properly train or oversee Manning.

More than 100 people gathered outside the McCurtain County Courthouse in Idabel on Monday, with many of them calling on the sheriff and other county officials to resign.

The sheriff’s office statement said there have been “a large number of threats of violence including death threats” against unspecified county employees, officials, their families and friends since the recording came to light.

The statement said the sheriff’s office will issue news releases until its investigation concludes “and findings are forwarded to the appropriate authorities for felony charges to be filed on those involved.”

The incident in Oklahoma follows the February killing of a television news reporter who was shot and killed and a cameraman wounded in Florida while filming a story about a homicide that happened earlier that day.

Oklahoma officials caught on tape talking of killing reporters and making racist remarks

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