For the most part, the judicial branch is where Oklahomans who are not criminals turn to for a semi-sane, kind-of functional government. Sure, we may have a judge or two pump his penis in court or send inmates to slave labor camps for petty drug crimes, but in Oklahoma, it's the flagship branch of Mary Fallin's experimental three branches of government.
Well, at least it is for now. According to some recent news reports, it looks like some Oklahoma judges are upping their game and asking Mary Fallin and the Oklahoma legislature to hold their beer.
First, let's take a look back Marshall County District Judge Wallace Coppedge. He's pictured above and to the left. You, and the rest of the outraged world, may remember him as the judge who signed off on a plea deal that sentenced a blind pedophile who could see well enough to tie-up and rape a child to 15 years of hard probation.
According to a recent investigation by The Oklahoman, this isn't the first time Judge Coppedge has agreed to a controversial plea deal. He apparently has a Charmin-level soft spot for child rapists and pedophiles:
The judge who approved probation for a church camp rapist has let other child rapists avoid prison, too, The Oklahoman has found...
Coppedge has been a judge for more than seven years and hears cases in five southern Oklahoma counties. Seven other times he has agreed a sex offender did not have to go to prison at all, The Oklahoman found from a review of his felony cases.
Most of those seven cases involved child rapes, the records show.
Most of the outcomes were the result of plea agreements made because of problems that arose after the cases were filed.
The most notable was a father charged in 2014 with raping four girls he had fostered then adopted. Under a 2016 plea deal, Steven Wayne Anglin, then of Ardmore, gave up his parental rights and was sentenced to 20 years on probation on two counts of rape by instrumentation. Anglin, 64, now lives in Shawnee.
The judge did not return messages left last week at the Marshall County courthouse seeking comment.
Well, I guess that explains why Marshall County was recently named by WalletHub as one of the best places to live for child rapists, pedophiles and sexual deviants.
Seriously, how can anyone, much less judge, sign off on plea deals that don't send rapists to jail? It's a disgrace to his profession and humanity in general. Judge Coppedge should do the right thing and resign.
If he does, a good person to replace him would be District Judge Curtis DeLapp. He's based out of Washington County, and unlike Judge Coppedge, he loves sending people to jail. It doesn't matter if you're a rapist or Connoisseur of sunflower seeds.
Via The Frontier:
A Bartlesville woman jailed for contempt after talking in court is asking the state Supreme Court to release her from jail where she’s been held without a bond since early January.
Randa Ludlow, 19, was a courtroom spectator when she was arrested for contempt last November, according to an application filed with the Oklahoma Supreme Court. The application originally named District Judge Curtis DeLapp, who ordered Ludlow to be arrested, as the defendant though it now identifies the Washington County Sheriff’s Office as the defendant in the case. The WCSO maintains the jail where Ludlow remains held.
The application also mentions other “abuses of power,” identifying at least a dozen other cases where DeLapp allegedly held attorneys, spectators, defendants and even potential jurors in contempt. Court records show a 33-year-old woman named Amanda Allred was ordered to jail in December 2015 by DeLapp and held with a $50,000 bond for leaving sunflower seeds on a bench and floor in the courtroom.
That may sound extreme, but in all fairness to Judge DeLapp, nobody wants to see chewed up saliva-filled sunflower seeds in a courtroom. They're the spit cup for people who are too smart to dip. Leave them in the baseball dugout where they belong!
Knowing how tough DeLapp can be towards people who misbehave in his courtrooms, I bet he's a hardass when it comes to sentencing people who are guilty of legitimately heinous crimes like rape.
Allred is still appearing in court regularly for reviews of her sentence. When she was jailed, DeLapp ordered her to be held on $50,000 bond — a bond $25,000 higher than the one court records show DeLapp gave Jeffrey Wade, a Bartlesville teacher who was arrested in 2010 and charged with rape for a sexual relationship with a student.
Okay. Take back everything I wrote above. Here's what Judge DeLapp had to say to The Frontier:
Reached for comment, DeLapp told The Frontier he was reviewing case law on Thursday in anticipation of Friday’s hearing before an Oklahoma Supreme Court Referee.
“I guess they’re saying I was illegally putting people in jail for contempt,” DeLapp said. “So I’m looking up case law to see if I did anything illegal.”
I only got a 149 on my LSAT, and my knowledge of judicial practices and procedures is limited to what Judge Wapner and Doug Llewelyn taught me in the 1980s, but shouldn't a judge look into the legality of a decision before slapping a $50,000 bond on someone who simply wanted to enjoy a protein-rich snack during court? It seems like a smart thing to do, but just like our lawmakers and governors, it appears not all Oklahoma judges are smart. They can be stupid idiots, too.
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