The Oklahoma County Commissioner Scandal

 

Bill Price prosecuted most of the County Commissioners

  When Republican President, Ronald Reagan started appointing conservative federal prosecutors and judges, The Democrats who ran Oklahoma began to sweat. Eventually, the IRS notified the Justice Department about fake billing invoices to county commissioners. Bill Price was one such federal prosecutor. After he sent scores of county commissioners to jail, he ran for governor. Sadly he lost, due to more corruption in David Walter's campaign funding.
   Harry Holloway, of the Oklahoma Historical Society said;

 In 1980 a huge scandal erupted stemming from the conviction of some 220 county commissioners and suppliers. Their convictions rose from involvement in a scheme of kickbacks paid on orders for county road-building supplies such as timber and gravel. The scandal reached all across the state in roughly sixty counties large and small, urban and rural. It had been going on for as long as anyone could remember. Again, federal officials rooted out the corruption.

Oklahoma Governor Goes To Prison

David Hall:

David Hall passed away this Spring. He has been living quietly since he left public life on his way to prison.

After the terrible governorships of the late 20s & early 30's, it wasn't  until the 1960s that major scandals again surfaced, and then they did so with a vengeance. Three justices of the Oklahoma Supreme Court were removed from office by impeachment or resignation arising from IRS investigations of reports that justices were taking kickbacks for favorable decisions. A powerful former speaker of the Oklahoma House of Representatives, who had been a dominant figure in state government, was convicted and sent to jail as a result of IRS investigations arising from charges that he failed to report income received in return for political favors. Then in 1975 a former governor, David Hall, was convicted, shortly after leaving office, of misusing his powers of office by trying to direct a state retirement fund to help a friend with a loan. Again, federal officials were the chief agents in cleaning up the corruption.

 Harry Holloway, of the Oklahoma Historical Society.

John Rogers & Son Leave High Offices, In Disgrace

  John Rogers was elected examiner and inspector in 1958 and won re-election four times until his defeat by Tom Daxon in 1978, the year the job was changed to that of auditor and inspector.

  He had narrowly been re-elected four years earlier after a legislative committee and a federal grand jury received evidence that his employees had received raises based on their campaign contributions for Gov. David Hall during Hall's successful 1970 campaign.

  Rogers and his son, then-Secretary of State John Rogers Jr., were called before the grand jury investigating Gov. Hall just weeks before the 1974 election. Both refused to answer questions and invoked their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.

  The allegations produced no charges against Rogers or his son.

  Nonetheless, they set off a chain of events which ultimately led to Hall's conviction on bribery and extortion charges and the resignation of John Rogers Jr. under threat of impeachment.

The Impeachment and Imprisonment Of 3 Oklahoma Supreme Court Justices

 

  Fifty years ago, Oklahomans were humiliated by revelations that three state Supreme Court justices had accepted bribes. Former Justices N.S. Corn, Earl Welch and N.B. Johnson served jail time for their criminal actions.

Judicial Scandal
In 1965, scandal burst forth in an unusual setting, the Oklahoma Supreme Court.  Three judges were implicated in taking payoffs to decide cases before the court. These three judges were either convicted in court or impeached. IRS inquiries laid much of the groundwork.
One of the guilty judges, N.S. Corn, became contrite and publicly described his misbehavior. He admitted that over about 20 years of taking payoff, he could not recall one single year in which he had not taken a payoff. Professor Phillip M. Simpson of Cameron University has researched one spectacular payoff case in which "Corn . swore that he had received $150,000 in $100 bills ... in a downtown Oklahoma City
meeting .... The attorney wuo had established the pattern with Corn was O.A. Cargill, former Oklahoma City mayor and Corn's friend for 50 years." This corruption obviously reached into the highest levels and included citizens usually deemed quite respectable. 

Speaker, Dan Draper, Convicted Of Election Fraud, In 1983

  The Oklahoma Speaker, Dan Draper, was convicted in 1983 for election tampering. He was trying to help his father win a seat in the Oklahoma legislature.

  The Tulsa World reported;

1983
  Then-House Speaker Dan Draper's troubles began in 1983.  He and House Majority Floor Leader Joe Fitzgibbon initially  were convicted of mail fraud and conspiracy charges for  allegedly fixing absentee ballots to help Draper's father  in an unsuccessful race for a House seat. Draper and Fitzgibbon  later won new trials (in 1985), but a federal judge dismissed  the charges at the behest of U.S. Attorney Roger Hilfiger.  Muskogee Democrat Jim Barker became the new speaker thanks  to Draper's troubles.