TULSA — A Broken Arrow lawmaker introduced a bill to impose a moratorium on executions in Oklahoma until a task force has thoroughly examined a number of recommendations that would help prevent the state from putting innocent people to death.
Rep. Kevin McDugle (R-Broken Arrow) spelled out his concerns before the House Criminal Justice and Corrections Committee late Wednesday morning.
[Hear the KRMG In Depth Report on a death penalty moratorium in Oklahoma HERE]
“My problem in our state right now is we cannot trust the system, period. And I hate it,” he said. “Here in Oklahoma, the reddest of the red, the most Christlike state that I know, and we cannot trust the system, because they’re not willing to stand up and admit mistakes, and fix them. Instead, they want us to all believe - they want the State of Oklahoma to believe - that everyone who’s gone through the system has had a fair and just trial.”
And that, he says, is demonstrably untrue.
He pointed out that when DNA testing became viable for evidentiary purposes, “many of the cases that had already gone through two trials were actually found innocent.”
More than ten percent of the death row inmates, he says, were cleared by DNA.
“Every one of those had somebody who wanted to see them put to death. Every one of those had a DA that wanted to see them put to death. Every one of them had two trials - like Glossip did,” McDugle claimed.
He was referring to Richard Glossip, whose case is what drew McDugle’s attention to the issues involved with Oklahoma’s death penalty, because of the egregious behavior of prosecutors, as even attested to by Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond.
“Oklahoma has blatantly carried out misjustice in Richard Glossip case alone,” McDugle said. “The DA at that time took a box of ten items, and put it under a different case number - on purpose - so that that box could be destroyed.”
Oklahoma lawmakers created a death penalty task force which in 2017 issued a 300-page report, listing one general and 45 specific recommendations on how to implement the death penalty while ensuring no innocent person gets executed.
“Not one of these recommendations that would help save an innocent person’s life has been implemented yet,” McDugle pointed out. “So this task force’s purpose is to look at those 45, and to see what we can get through the House.”
The general recommendation by that task force was a moratorium on executions, just as McDugle’s bill would implement.
He wanted a five-year hiatus on executions, but after discussion in committee led by Majority Caucus Co-Chair Rep. Danny Williams (R-Seminole), he agreed that he would amend the bill to mandate a two-year moratorium instead.
While the bill passed 4-0 in the committee, it will likely face a difficult road to final passage.