An Oklahoma County man is charged with threatening Oklahoma’s Supreme Court Justices, and a Tulsa County man with a history of bizarre behavior is accused of threatening to take the life of a federal judge and return to the courthouse with an armed militia and take hostages.
Jerry Dean Rice II, 44, of Del City, is alleged to have left a voicemail message with the Phillips Murrah law firm in Oklahoma City on Nov. 28, 2022, threatening to kill all of the judges on the state Supreme Court.
An Oklahoma Highway Patrol trooper wrote in an affidavit that the message concluded with this statement: “I don’t like killing people but that’s the job of the United States, to take care of the business of the day, for the people of America and its safety. Amen.”
The audio recording was provided to the Oklahoma Department of Public Safety and an investigation led to Rice, the trooper reported.
Rice posted a video of himself on Facebook in which he claimed to be the 43rd President of the United States. In the voicemail message recorded in November, the caller claimed to be the 43rd President of the United States. Rice also referred to himself as an “independent reformer of the United States,” the trooper wrote.
A misdemeanor charge of threatening a violent act was filed against Rice in Oklahoma County District Court on Nov. 29. He was released from custody Dec. 28 on $50,000 bond pending his next court appearance.
A protective order was issued against Rice in Oklahoma County on Aug. 29, 2022, in a domestic abuse case.
In Tulsa, U.S. Attorney Clint Johnson filed a criminal complaint Jan. 13 against Cole Walker Morris, 29, of Tulsa, accusing him of threatening to kidnap, assault or murder a United States judge.
An FBI task force officer wrote that in the early afternoon of Jan. 10, Morris approached the intake counter at the Page Belcher Federal Courthouse, with a handful of papers, to ask questions about the dismissal of one of several lawsuits he filed there. An employee explained the documents to him and why it had been dismissed.
According to the FBI agent’s affidavit, Morris then became agitated and uttered menacing statements.
Morris allegedly threatened to hold down Chief U.S. District Judge John F. Heil III and stated that the judge was going to “give his life.” Morris also said he would return to the courthouse with an armed militia and take hostages.
He asked the courthouse employee if the glass between them was bulletproof, said he could rape employees “and no one being able to stop him,” and declared that he was simply “stating his rights as an American.”
“At this point, Court staff hit a duress alarm to notify Court security officers,” the FBI agent related. Morris vowed he would return “and fled the building,” Johnson said.
A warrant for Morris’ arrest apparently remained outstanding last week.
Morris filed one case in Tulsa’s federal court in 2019 and seven in 2022; all were filed by himself rather than by an attorney. All of the petitions were handwritten, and all were summarily dismissed.
He sued the Rogers County Jail in federal court in July 2019 for “cruel and unusual punishment of a handicaped [sic] person.”
In June 2022 Morris filed suit in Tulsa’s federal district court against the United States of America. In his petition he accused the Boulder and Denver, Colorado, police departments of “attempted murder by EMSA, suffocation with towel;” claimed the Tulsa Police Department “covered up a dangerously falsified police report; accused the Tenderloin Police Department of a “coverup of my rape with a bio terror device infused with AIDS;” claimed a Marine Core [sic] recruiter named Ivan in California was “involved in a murder plot that involved the L.A.P.D.;” and said the San Diego Police Department refused to assist him when he reported his attempted murder “from multiple assailants.”
Morris filed five lawsuits against the “United State’s” [sic] in October 2022.
In one he claimed “my wrist was cut up and down from direct psycho manipulations and weapons placement. They didn’t know that Iv [sic] weaponized my body and mind in advanced combat training…” In another he claimed he sustained “extensive neural trauma” while incarcerated in the Rogers County Jail. And he sought $25 billion for “harassment, threats, privacy invasion and illegal information sharing” while he was in front of the federal courthouse.
Federal District Judge Gregory Frizzell finally got fed up. On Dec. 19, in dismissing yet another of Morris’ lawsuits, the judge wrote:
“This court has reviewed the filing history of Mr. Morris … and finds that his numerous, pro se filings are frivolous and constitute an abusive practice. Therefore, Mr. Morris is enjoined from filing any further complaints in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma without first obtaining permission from the Chief Judge.”