In much of eastern Oklahoma, sheriff's deputies and other state officers also hold commissions from tribal nations. That raises a hard question for families: when an officer with a tribal cross-commission hurts someone, can that officer be sued under federal civil rights law? A Tenth Circuit decision this summer, Walden v. City of Duncan, made the answer clearer, and it is already changing how these cases are litigated, including one of ours. Why color of state law matters Th

On October 5, 2026, the Supreme Court declined to hear Betty Shelby's appeal in the Terence Crutcher lawsuit. Here is what qualified immunity is, and what that order does and does not mean.

Since Kill. Bury. Print., people who were held in the McCurtain County jail have been asking whether what happened to them was illegal, and whether it is too late to act.

Custer, Delaware, Cherokee, Creek, Muskogee and McCurtain. Six Oklahoma counties, one pattern, and what it took to make each of them answer for what happened inside their jails.

Peacock's documentary Kill. Bury. Print. covers the McCurtain Gazette's reporting on the McCurtain County Sheriff's Office. Here is a short guide to the three federal civil rights cases our firm is handling there.

Marion Whitten was held in the McCurtain County Jail in January 2022. His federal civil rights lawsuit against former jail officials, Whitten v. Hendrix, is pending in the Eastern District of Oklahoma.

On September 15, 2021, Roper Harris was booked into the McCurtain County Jail in Idabel. What happened to him that night is now part of the federal court record, and the account came from men who worked at the jail.

On September 21, 2026, the Tenth Circuit vacated the judgment that had ended the federal civil rights case over Bobby Barrick's death and sent it back to the district court to apply Walden v. City of Duncan.

I was one of the lawyers for Daniel Bosh. His case gave people beaten by jailers a state court remedy for about a year, and then the Legislature took it away.

How families can hold Oklahoma county jails accountable for deaths and denied medical care, who can be held responsible, and the deadlines that apply.