A few years ago, we received a tip via the Ogle Mole Network alerting us to a series of 911 domestic disturbance calls made from the residence of Mary Fallin’s right-hand man Preston Doerflinger in 2012.
The Mole’s email included a set of “911 Public Safety Communication Records” that showed the date and time of the calls, along with the phone numbers they originated from. Only one page included the reason or “issue.” Check it out:
We’re not “professional journalists” at The Lost Ogle, but we pursued the story to the best of our ability. Outside of the call logs the Mole provided, we weren’t able to access any police or arrest reports, 911 audio or anything else to document or back up what actually happened.
We also reached out to the alleged victim – Preston’s now ex-wife. Via text message, she explained she would talk to us “off-record” and that “other people were seeking more information.” She claimed she wanted everyone to have the details “in a similar time frame.” Despite a couple of follow ups, we never heard from her again. She basically ghosted us.
Due to our limited resources and her reluctance to talk, we stopped pursuing the story. I forwarded the information to a trusted contact in the Tulsa media in hopes they could gather more information. Since then, I haven’t heard anything about the incident.
Well, until now…
Yesterday afternoon, the Tulsa Frontier dropped a big expose on what happened that night in September of 2012. This includes disturbing details from a police report that alleges Doerflinger choked his wife after she accused him of having an affair.
Via The Frontier:
Tulsa Police officers responding to a domestic violence call at Preston Doerflinger’s home in 2012 were told by his now ex-wife that Doerflinger choked her twice during an argument and abruptly ended a phone call with emergency dispatchers, according to records…
Doerflinger was not jailed or charged with domestic violence after the alleged 2012 incident, with his then-wife although he was placed in handcuffs “for detainment purposes,” according to a police report. The Frontier filed an Open Records request for all reports of 911 calls from Doerflinger’s address but was not provided the report in response. However, a police spokesman read the report to a reporter from The Frontier…
For those who are new, this isn’t the first time Preston Doerflinger – a man who oversaw the state budget and is now in charge of saving what’s left of the Oklahoma Department of Health – has made the news for the wrong reasons.
We broke the story about his DUI-related arrest in 2015. It was the result of a 911 caller reporting that a man (Doerflinger) was holding a woman against her will in a car at a 7-Eleven on NW Expressway in OKC. We’ve also documented his dangerous obsession with speeding, and that he was crisscrossing Oklahoma with a revoked driver’s license.
Here’s more about what happened the night of the incident:
Tulsa PD Spokesman Shane Tuell said the report states that when officers arrived at Doerflinger’s home they were greeted by his wife, who was “crying, sweating and thanking the officer for arriving.”
Tuell said the report states that Doerflinger’s wife told the officer the couple had begun arguing, and that Doerflinger began to choke her. She broke away, according to Tuell’s retelling of the report, and called 911, to which she stated Doerflinger took the phone and ended the call.
“He then forced her into the laundry room and choked her again,” Tuell said the report states.
Tuell said the report states Doerflinger’s wife filled out a victim’s statement, but later asked to retract it, saying her husband “was head of (the Department of Human Services) and she did not want him to lose his job.”
You can read the rest of The Frontier report here. It has a lot of information and details that you think would warrant Doerflinger’s immediate resignation or termination. It also touches on efforts by the always reputable Tulsa PD to try and block public access to the 911 recordings.
The only thing The Frontier’s report seems to be missing is a statement or comment from the victim – Preston’s ex-wife. I still had her phone number from when we looked into this stuff back in 2015, so I sent her a text. Before I could even tell her my name or who I was with, she fired off this pointed response:
In all fairness, The Frontier literally isn’t a “real newspaper.” It’s an obscure local investigative news website. That being said, this still feels like a real story. Although I understand why a victim may not want to pursue charges, Doerflinger is a public figure with a checkered past who holds a powerful position in the public trust. He needs to be held accountable, work on his life, and get the hell out of Oklahoma government. According to this tweet by Dylan Goforth, that may be happening soon:
Board is going back into executive session to discuss employment status of Preston Doerflinger as a result of "news from the last 24 hours."
— Dylan Goforth (@DGoforth918) February 13, 2018
=
UPDATE #1: Preston Doerflinger has resigned! We’ll have a full report soon.
UPDATE #2. The victim in this case, his ex wife, sent us the following statement:
Hope it takes him down. He’s a creep.
+100
It did. He had to resign this afternoon effective immediately.
I’ve always thought he had pictures or video of Mary because he keeps getting promotions and raises for doing a crappy job. How he skated by on the CFO resigning and PD using secret info from the grand jury is unbelievable. Not that anybody would want to see pictures of Mary, but then again, maybe he’s promising her that he WILL release them if he can just get one more promotion and she keeps believing him.
I think Mary has brought more than enough embarrassment to herself. I don’t think pictures could bring her down any more. Lol
What the hell does it take to get rid of them both?? they both have screwed Ok. I wish someone who knows more dirt would come out and blast them both. Being held accountable would be sweet justice.
There’s just more where this piece of shit came from…
If I were his ex wife I would get a Restraining Order against him today while the courts are still open. I don’t see how the board will keep him after reading that article. The spousal abuse is just one layer of the onion of problems that is Mr Doerflinger.
Mary Fallin’s infatuation with Mr. Doerflinger speaks volumes of her leadership and management abilities. It’s a shame there isn’t a Board that the public can’t go before to have her removed from office.
Just when you think it can’t get any worse, and how our local media and local government are co-dependent and keep this corrupt muck going.
And he’s outta there!
http://www.news9.com/story/37497102/doerflinger-resigns-as-interim-director-of-okla-health-department
Outta there, but what you wanna bet that he gets his job at OMES back since he was only interim commissioner?
If you go to the OMES Web site, his smiling face still greets you. And he’s STILL a cabinet secretary for Mary Fallin. No worries, he’ll still wake up on the state payroll tomorrow.
Is this one of those Kirk Humphreys things, OK for some boards/jobs, not okay for others? Oklahoma Standard?
Woohoo!! The Lost Ogle MAKES things happen! He has just resigned from the OMES too!
The fact is he gave a ton of cash to Mary and others right before being appointed says it all.
Ralph Shortey’s official parking space had been repainted within 24 hours of his departure.
“Flounder” Dorf-MAN just got expelled from Faber!!!!
I’ll be laughing about this comment for a while…. Thanks!
Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life young man!
(however it will qualify you to be Governor, State elected official, or head of any number of “floundering” state agencies until your history of violence is disclosed!)
How can anyone be surprised about these recent events? Clearly the guy gave a ton of cash to the powers that be (Oklahoma Ethics Commission – Public Disclosure website). That was his qualification to be head of OMES. True, he previously served as Tulsa’s city auditor (again an elected position), but wasn’t he limited from running again because he didn’t meet the new qualifications to run for office? Regardless, now is the time for a full blown financial audit at OMES. In particular, the cost and effectiveness of consolidating state IT services should be scrutinized.
Mary appoints him as Interim head, despite the fact he didn’t meet the qualifications to actually be the head of the agency. I’m sure somehow this is fine, as it is an emergency and he is an interim. However what is the point of putting in an interim head who isn’t qualified? I know he is Mary’s golden boy, but the more you look into him he doesn’t appear to be qualified to do very much except draw a huge paycheck from the state.
The domestic abuse is actually the least of his problems, although it does show his abusive personality, and anger issues which have crept into his job performance. I’m sure we will never be able to get the whole story as to why he is Mary’s golden boy, and the other nit-wits she has elevated into high powered positions.
I have always believed Mary to be not very smart, and so many of her appointments have shown this, there are just too many mistakes in judgement on her part. We also know just how corrupt Oklahoma is, the problem is our local officials tend to cover the powerful. The Tulsa police not cooperating with a Freedom of Information request for the 911 call is just one example. Louisiana and Chicago are beginning to look more honest than Oklahoma.
What I am afraid of is Preston Doerflinger will be back in another spot in state government, just like all of Joy Hofmeister’s legal problems disappeared with no real explanation and the public will probably reelect her.
Aside from voter apathy we have a huge, huge problem in Oklahoma. Audits are a first step, and hopefully we will get some honest auditors, and then actually have them reported to the public. You can always track where the money went. Then we need to make sure that if any laws have been broken, use this evidence to bring criminal charges against those people. Even if agency heads were not criminally liable for the money disappearing if they signed off on anything without due diligence they should at minimum lose their job.
Let’s don’t do the Mary Fallin Oklahoma Standard of giving these people immunity, and pretending this will fix the problem. Get all this out there now, and maybe we can clean up some of this mess in November, and get the Fallin influence and stain off the state as we try to undo all the damage she and her cronies have done.
I’m starting to wonder if we even have a functional government at any level any more. By and for the people? It seems everything has devolved into partisan backstabbing and trying to sabotage each other at every chance they can find. WTF has happened to this country?
Too bad this didn’t make national media. It would fit in nicely with Trump’s brigade of violent bigots. When are the people who vote Republican going to get the message? R= really bad. Cognitive dissonance may be the death of this country.