Oklahoma sheriff, officials under fire for leaked ‘lynching’ discussion

An Oklahoma sheriff and other county officials are under fire after they were recorded chatting about lynching black people and killing a local newspaper reporter.

McCurrtain County Sheriff Kevin Clardy and three local pols are now being bombarded with protests and Gov. Kevin Stitt has called for them to resign after their secretly-recorded conversation went public on Friday, The Oklahoman reported.

“I’m gonna tell you something,” McCurtain County Commissioner Mark Jennings is heard saying on the leaked March 6 conversation first published by the McCurtain Gazette-News.

“If it was back in the day when that, when [former county Sheriff] Alan Marshton would take a damn black guy and whoop their ass and throw him in a cell? It’d run for sheriff,” Jennings said.

“Yeah,” Sheriff Clardy replied. “Well, it’s not like that no more.”

“I know,” Jennings said. “Take them down to Mud Creek and hang them up with a damn rope. But you can’t do that anymore. They got more rights than we got.”

Clardy, Jennings, and sheriff’s office Investigator Alicia Manning then discuss Chris Willingham, a reporter for the Gazette-News who had been critical of county government.

“The old saying is, what goes around goes around,” Clardy said. “It will. I told you it will.”

Jennings then replied, “I know where two big deep holes are here if you ever need them.”

“I’ve got an excavator,” Clardy said.

“Well, these are already pre-dug,” said Jennings.

Jennings then jokes, “I’ve known two or three hit men. They’re very quiet guys.”

Manning then chimes in, according to the outlet.

“Yeah, but here’s the reality,” she said. “If a hair on his wife’s head, Chris Willingham’s head, or any of those people that really were behind that, if any hair on their head got touched by anybody, who would be the bad guy?”

On Monday night, the McCurtain sheriff’s office issued a bizarre statement online, saying it was reluctantly investigating the incident — and probing whether the recording was made illegally or altered.

“The last 72 hours have been amongst the most difficult and disruptive in recent memory,” the office said on Facebook. “This is a very complex situation and one we regret having to address.”

“Our preliminary information in indicates that the media-released audio recording has, in fact, been altered,” the statement said. “The motivation for doing so remains unclear at this point. The matter is actively being investigated.”

The sheriff’s office also said that “a large number of threats of violence, including death threats, have been made against county employees and officials, their families and friends.”

But on Tuesday, Eddy Dempsey, (R-Valliant) said the sheriff and his pals need to quit.

“I honestly think they should resign,” said Dempsey. “I mean, to this point, there’s no hearsay, no two words [about it]. They were recorded, so it should be a resignation.”

Clardy and the others on the recording have declined to comment to reporters.