5. Ryan Walters’ shadow looms over election losses in three Tulsa School Board races
Publication date: April 5
Backlash over State Superintendent Ryan Walters’ attacks on local schools swayed voters in Tulsa Public Schools board races this year. Three candidates won after promising to protect Tulsa schools from threats of a state takeover.
Update: The Tulsa school board voted in December to authorize attorneys to defend the board against a lawsuit related to the resignation of former Tulsa Public Schools Superintendent Deborah Gist and hiring Ebony Johnson to lead the district.
The lawsuit claims Gist and four board members violated the Oklahoma Open Meetings Act when they voted on Gist’s separation agreement in 2023 and hired Johnson. Board members Jennettie Marshall and E’Lena Ashley and the parent of a charter school student filed the lawsuit in January 2024 in Tulsa County District Court. Marshall and Ashley are suing the board as private citizens, rather than in their capacity as board members, the lawsuit states. They are represented by Maria Seidler, who ran for a school board position earlier this year. Seidler was defeated by Sarah Smith.
Walters has also proposed rules that would require students to produce proof of citizenship or legal immigration status in order to be enrolled. The school district posted a video in response, informing parents they do “not collect, require or report any information related to immigration status to the state or federal governments.”
-Dylan Goforth
Three men died in separate incidents at the Lawton Correctional and Rehabilitation Center in 2023 after guards skipped security checks and falsified records. Guards that falsify records can face criminal charges under state law, but the Oklahoma Department of Corrections didn’t forward the cases to the Comanche County District Attorney’s Office.
Publication date: Sept. 6
Update: Debbie Hand, the mother of a man who died of a drug overdose in 2023, said she wants to file a lawsuit because she believes her son’s death was preventable. Two men died in May after a large brawl between two groups of prisoners at the Lawton prison. Private prison contractor The Geo Group, which runs the Lawton facility, didn’t respond to The Frontier’s request for comment on pending criminal charges or what they are doing to ensure future officers don’t skip security checks.
-Ashlynd Huffman
3. Sold out: The rise and fall of America’s most ambitious sports media company.
Publication date: June 24
While Sellout Crowd, an ambitious startup that sought to refigure Oklahoma’s sports media landscape, shut down in May, the drama around the site hasn’t slowed. Sports columnist Berry Tramel claimed he was misled into signing documents making him a guarantor of a loan that funded the website.
Update: Big Dog Media, which loaned the startup around $1.5 million prior to its launch, sued in Cleveland County District Court to try to collect money from several of the site’s founders. Big Dog Media is represented by attorney Armando Rosell, who also represented Sellout Crowd during its existence. Sellout Crowd staff said they were told Big Dog Media was formed by now-deceased country music star Toby Keith, as well as former OU football coach Bob Stoops, and some of Keith’s family and business partners.
Tramel filed for bankruptcy in November, according to court records. A bankruptcy filing will make it more difficult for Big Dog Media to collect on the more than $600,000 it seeks in the lawsuit. A judge issued a default judgement against Sellout Crowd founder Michael Koehler, after he did not respond to the lawsuit. The lawsuit is still pending against Kris Murray, another of Sellout Crowd’s founders, and Mike Sherman, an editor at Sellout Crowd.
-Dylan Goforth
2. Judge in Innocent Man case agrees to suppress original confession by Karl Fontenot
A judge in Tulsa County tossed out Karl Fontenot’s confession to the robbery, kidnapping and murder of an Ada convenience store clerk. Fontenot and his co-defendant Tommy Ward claim they were coerced into admitting to the murder of Donna Denise Haraway and used details fed to them by law enforcement in their false confessions.
Publication date: Feb. 22
Update: State prosecutors have appealed the judge’s ruling to toss Fontenot’s confession to the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals. Fontenot’s attorneys must file a brief with the appeals court by Jan. 6. arguing why the Tulsa judge’s order should stand. The state’s prosecution of Fontenot will go into its 41st year in 2025, as a state appeals court is set to rule on the admissibility of Fontenot’s alleged confession to police in 1984. A federal judge overturned Fontenot’s conviction and life sentence were overturned in 2019 after Ada police discovered hundreds of pages of evidence that were not turned over to defense attorneys. In 2022, prosecutors announced they would re-file charges against Fontenot, but were concerned that many of the witnesses in the case had died or could no longer remember details.
Ward had his conviction overturned in a state court because of the newly-discovered evidence, but the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals later overturned the ruling. Ward’s case is now being heard in federal court. He remains in prison. Fontenot is currently free on bond.
-Clifton Adcock
1.We fact-checked what Oklahoma law says about teaching the Bible in schools
Publication date: July 11
Oklahoma State Superintendent Ryan Walters issued a directive this summer requiring schools to incorporate the Bible into classroom lessons. We found that state law prohibits the teaching of sectarian or religious doctrine in Oklahoma public schools but allows the reading of Scripture. State law also gives local school districts the exclusive power to determine “the instruction, curriculum, reading lists and instructional materials and textbooks.”
Update: A group of citizens filed a lawsuit at the Oklahoma Supreme Court in October to stop Walters and the State Department of Education from requiring public schools to teach the Bible and a planned multi-million dollar state purchase of Bibles for classrooms. The Department of Education later cancelled plans to spend $3 million on Bibles and announced in November a much-smaller purchase of 532 Bibles for advanced placement government classes. The “God Bless The USA” Bibles the agency bought are sold by Lee Greenwood and endorsed by President-elect Donald Trump, Fox23 reported. The $24,540 the Department of Education paid for the Bibles falls just below the $25,000 threshold that would require the agency to seek competitive bids under state law.
The lawsuit is still pending. The Department of Education and Walters argued in a court filing in December that the Bible will be taught “for its secular value” and that there are plans to seek competitive bids to purchase more Bibles soon.
-Brianna Bailey
