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An Oklahoma sheriff and other officials in McCurtain County were caught on audio talking about "beating, killing and burying" local reporters and complaining about how they could no longer hang Black people with a “damned rope.”
According to NBC News, McCurtain County Sheriff Kevin Clardy, county Commissioner Mark Jennings, sheriff's investigator Alicia Manning, and Jail Administrator Larry Hendrix made the comments in a recording published by the McCurtain County Gazette-News, a family-owned newspaper.
Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt has called for their resignations and ordered the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation to “initiate an investigation to determine whether any illegal conduct has occurred.”
“I am both appalled and disheartened to hear of the horrid comments made by officials in McCurtain County,” Stitt said in a statement on Sunday (April 16). “There is simply no place for such hateful rhetoric in the state of Oklahoma, especially by those that serve to represent the community through their respective office.”
The audio was obtained by Bruce Willingham, a reporter at McCurtain County Gazette-News who left a recording device in the commissioners' chamber last month after receiving a tip that officials were "illegally engaging in county business after the public meetings were over," per NBC News.
Willingham's son, Christopher Lee Willingham, who is also a reporter at the newspaper, had filed a lawsuit at the time against Clardy, Manning, and the commissioners in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma, alleging that they were spreading "slander" about him in retaliation of his hard-hitting reporting.
When Willingham retrieved the device, he discovered officials' remarks about his son.
"My papaw would have whipped his ass, would have wiped him and used him for toilet paper," Manning said of the younger Willingham, according to the newspaper. "If my daddy hadn't been run over by a vehicle, he would have been down there."
Jennings responded: "I know where two big, deep holes are here if you ever need them."
"I've got an excavator," Clardy added, according to the newspaper.
Jennings allegedly then noted that he knew "two or three hit men."
The conversation shifted to officials discussing who might run for sheriff against Clardy. Jennings recalled how a former sheriff used to "take a damned Black guy and whoop their ass and throw them in the cell."
"Yeah," Clardy allegedly said back. "It's not like that no more."
"I know," Jennings continued. "Take them down to Mud Creek and hang them up with a damned rope. But you can't do that anymore. They've got more rights than we've got."
Willingham has turned over the full audio to the FBI and the Oklahoma Attorney General’s office, according to his lawyers.
In response to the recording, the McCurtain County Sheriff's Office said it was "illegally obtained" and appears to be altered. The office has reportedly launched an investigation into how the recording was obtained and whether it violated the secret recording law.
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