Oklahoma City
A former employee of the Oklahoma City Thunder NBA team is facing federal charges for allegedly storming the U.S. Capitol January 6, the Associated Press.
Danielle Nicole Doyle, 37, is charged in a four-county criminal complaint with knowingly entering a restricted building, knowingly engaging in disorderly conduct in a restricted building and two counts of violent entry on Capitol grounds. She was taken into custody by the U.S. Marshal’s office and made an initial appearance last week in federal court in Oklahoma City. A judge set her bond at $10,000, according to AP.
The Thunder confirmed Doyle worked for the team as an account manager until December 2020. One of Doyle’s attorneys, Irven Box, said the four counts are all misdemeanors. “She is not charged with damaging anything in the Capitol or causing harm to anyone. She’s a fabulous young lady passionate about politics,” Box said.
Two of Doyle’s former coworkers told investigators they recognized her in video footage from the Capitol invasion. In one surveillance video, Doyle can be seen climbing through a Capitol window. Doyle is the second Oklahoman to be charged in the January 6 attack on the Capitol by supporters of then-President Donald Trump. Andrew Craig Ericson, 23 of Muskogee, was charged in January, AP reported.
Statewide
Oklahoma is expected to receive 31,500 doses this week of a newly approved Johnson & Johnson vaccine which only requires one dose, making it ideal for people who may have problems making two appointments, the Associated Press reported.
The new vaccine also doesn’t require ultra-cold storage, giving state health officials more flexibility in storing and distributing. Reed said the new vaccine offers strong protection against what matters most: serious illness, hospitalizations and death, according to AP.
“A one-shot vaccine is useful to reach populations in more remote, rural area,” Reed said, as well as for people with transportation or health problems which might make it difficult to show up for a second appointment, AP reported.
So far, more than 1.1 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines have been administered in Oklahoma. According to date from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Oklahoma currently ranks 10th among states, with 17.9 percent of its population having received at least one dose, compared to the national average of 15.3 percent, according to AP.
Oklahoma City
Last week, Jordan Glen Young pleaded guilty to wire fraud and signing a false federal income tax return, in connection with a $2.3 million embezzlement from an Oklahoma City trust bank, according to a release from the U.S. Department of Justice.
December 21, 2020, Young was charged by information with one count of wire fraud and one count of filing a false federal income tax return. From 2006 through March 2020, Young worked at an Oklahoma City trust bank as a trust administrative officer. Young oversaw accounts and distributed funds from those accounts to the beneficiaries as needed, according to the release.
February 22, 2021, Young pleaded guilty to making an unauthorized distribution in the amount of $60,706.53 to his personal checking account from a trust account he was managing in October 2018. As part of his plea, Young Admitted he embezzled funds from his former employer from December 2015 through March 2020, and stipulated the total loss to the trust bank from his embezzlement scheme was $2,323.036.91, according to the release.
In addition to wire fraud, Young also pleaded guilty to signing a false federal income tax return. He admitted April 15, 2019, he signed a personal federal income tax return for the 2018 calendar your he knew was false because it reported only $114,439 in total income. At the plea hearing, Young admitted he omitted the 2018 tax return thousands of dollars of embezzled income form the trust bank, according to the release.
Oklahoma City
As many as 10 death row inmates in Oklahoma, more than one-fifth of the state’s prisoners condemned to die, could escape execution because of a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling concerning criminal jurisdiction in Indian Country, the Associated Press reported.
The inmates have challenged their convictions in state court following the high court’s ruling last year, dubbed the McGirt decision, which determined a large swath of Eastern Oklahoma remains an American Indian reservation. The decision means Oklahoma prosecutors lack the authority to pursue criminal charges for cases in which the defendants, or the victims, are tribal citizens, according to AP.
Dozens of inmates convicted in non-death penalty cases also are seeking to have their convictions tossed, which is expected to result in a dramatic increase in the workload of federal prosecutors. The cases are being reexamined in district court to determine if the defendant or victims are enrolled member of a federally recognized tribe and if the crime occurred on a tribal reservation, AP reported.
If those conditions are met, it’s likely the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals will toss the convictions and force the cases to be retried in federal court where obtaining a death sentence is much more difficult. Although federal prosecutors have the authority to pursue the death penalty, the tribal nation also must agree to allow the death penalty, according to AP.