Conservatives are always trying to be reasonable. Liberals take advantage of that by pushing soft on crime initiatives like SQ 780 and 788, now we are faced with two more budget breaking citizen petitions; Medicaid expansion and preventing multiple offender criminals from having their sentences upgraded to felonies.
Medicaid expansion can be stopped by forcing changes in the medical care industry, forcing people to have skin in the game, forcing providers to provide up front published pricing in advance, and getting medical dollars out of politics. There is no reason to allow an industry to grow rich by bankrupting those who get sick or injured.
The soft on crime initiatives is also easy to solve. Stop sending people to prison for thirty years after they have been a career criminal for the previous fifteen years. Do that by dealing with criminals that commit a second offense quickly, surely, and inexpensively to the state and society. Cutting criminals slack after the first offense does not work. The only ones that benefits are those that make money off the criminal justice system.
Meet Earl Ray Talley Jr., the third mass parole career criminal that has been re arrested since the November mass release from Oklahoma's prisons. Talley had 36 years worth of sentences against him and served around 1 1/2 years in prison before he was turned loose in November. Talley was re arrested December third 2019 after being caught fighting with another man at a home, arrested for domestic assault and battery in the presence of a minor. The case is a misdemeanor, CM-2019-1644 , but this man has enormous list of felonies and misdemeanors and his case shows the futility of releasing career criminals.
Talley's adult record of his life of crime begins in Kingfisher County where he has twenty arrests and two protective orders against him. His first arrest was for malicious destruction of property in 1998 to which he pled guilty and was fined a few hundred dollars. CM-1998-00151 About a year goes by with no payment, before he is arrested for non payment and ordered to spend 13 days in jail to pay off his fines. At that point he is in for about $320.00 in costs and fees. Not a good solution, the county taxpayer paying to hold him in jail because he won't pay the costs of his prosecution on the first offense.
Next was August of 1999, arrested for public intoxication. CM-1999-00082 Talley pleads guilty, fined $210.00, which isn't paid and he is re arrested in late 1999 for non payment. He gets 49 days in jail to pay off the $245.00 in costs and fees. We are talking about $5.00 per day here. And it costs the taxpayers at least $30.00 per day to keep him in jail.
Next is an arrest in July of 2000, CM-2000-00123 , he pleads guilty and pays around $270.00 in fines and fees. He has appeared to have learned that sitting in jail for $5.00 a day is not productive.
Next is again in July, of 2002, CM-2002-00076 , public intoxication again. Cost is $148 00 in costs and $100 in fines, pleads guilty and pays his bill.
In April of 2004 Talley earns his first protective order. PO-2004-00069 , which he settles by paying the costs of $169.00 and gets it dismissed. No doubt that he was in the wrong but must have worked things out with his victim.
Next up is November of 2006, CM-2006-00267 , another public intoxication charge, pleads guilty, $378.00 in costs and fees, paid out over about three years.
Next is February of 2008, CM-2008-00076 , driving with a suspended/revoked license, $308.00 in fines and fees after he pleads guilty, three years later after being arrested for non payment and not showing up to court Talley serves out about five weeks to pay his fees and fines.
Next is April of 2008, CM-2008-00128 , possession of controled substances, Talley has graduated to being a drug addict it appears. After a guilty plea and $351 in costs and fines Talley spends the next three years in and out of court before he serves out five weeks in jail to pay his fines and costs and is released in January of 2011.
Next is an arrest in December of 2008, CM-2008-00378 , four counts, DUI, driving under suspension, driving without insurance, and transporting open bottle, pleads guilty, gets two years and nine months in county jail for all four counts, all served concurrently, all suspended except for four weekends in jail to be served within 90 days. After all is sorted out he owes $1980.00, which he is still paying on four years later after multiple re arrests for failure to appear, and multiple motions to revoke the suspended sentence to attempt to force him to pay his bill.
Next is another arrest in April of 2009, CM-2009-00132 , reckless conduct with a firearm, he racks up $705.00 in fines and fees as the case drags out over the next five years with numerous court appearances for failure to appear or pay. His initial sentence of six months in county jail is suspended and he could have walked out with maybe $250.00 in costs and fees. Talley is in and out of various programs like First Step, only the threat of revoking his suspended sentence gets his attention. Every few months is another court hearing where he agrees once more to a payment plan that he refuses to follow. One sees that the county continues squeezing the stone for blood for that five years.
Next is July of 2009, CM-2009-00203 , disturbance by abusive and threatening language, $1408.00 in fines and fees over the next five years after a guilty plea that could have been settled for with a few hundred in costs and fees and thirty days in jail served concurrently with other sentences. Talley winds up spending a few weeks in jail and finally paying off some of the fines and fees by 2014.
But by December of 2009 Talley is arrested again, CM-2009-00386 , his fourth offense of driving with a suspended license, leaving the scene of an accident, and failure to carry insurance. $2275.00 is his fines, fees, jail medical costs, over a five year time frame. Talley is in and out of several programs with his case delayed till January 2011 where he pleads guilty and gets around 90 days in jail and is ordered to pay around $44.00 in restitution but the next three years is spent in and out of court making and breaking payment agreements.
In 2011 Talley is once again arrested, CM-2011-00203 , assault and battery and public intoxication. He pleads guilty, $614.00 in fines and fees and three years of court hearings, guilty plea to about 120 days in jail served concurrently with his other sentences. Three months later he is out and agreeing to pay monthly which he doesn't and that continues for the next three years.
About four months later he is arrested again, CM-2011-00298 , his fifth arrest for driving under a suspended/revoked drivers license. This time he is hit with some massive costs on his jail stay, $4567.00 including the fines and fees. He got 90 days in jail and could have settled his costs for under $400.00 at that point. Instead he winds up in jail in January of 2014 on a $4760.00 bond over his costs and fees that he has refused to pay over the last three years.
In July of 2012 Talley was arrested again, CM-2012-00170 , another driving with a suspended/revoked license charge. As usual the initial fees are $240.00 and another $662.00 as the case drags on. He gets 20 days in jail, served out one day at a time on Sundays. The case drags out another two years with Talley paying nothing.
In February of 2013 Talley is arrested again, CM-2013-00031 , another driving while suspended/revoked and another failure to tag his vehicle, one of many from previous years that were listed as traffic fines instead of criminal. This time the prosecutor files misdemeanor charges for the tags. $327.00 in initial fees, another $375.00 in final fees plus $250.00 in actual fines. Talley pleads guilty, gets two six month suspended sentences, doesn't pay anything so he is arrested by the end of 2013, gets out on bail bond, agrees to pay, doesn't pay of course. He appears to have paid around $40.00 in very small amounts and gets a late payment notice for seven misdemeanors with a unpaid balance of around $10,800.00. This was in May of 2016, showing his last payment made in December of 2015.
In April of 2013 Talley was arrested again, CM-2013-00067 , another driving with a suspended license. He pleads guilty and gets six months in jail and a $300.00 fine, suspended with D.A. Supervision. $790.00 in costs including the $300.00 fine, and he pays around $55.00 according to the records.
In September of 2015 Talley gets his first two felony arrests in Kingfisher County, CF-2015-00112 , a felony DUI, possession of controlled substances (meth),and his second leaving the scene of an accident. $5592.00 in total charges after two two years dragging the case out with failure to appear, multiple bail bonds, numerous attorneys that withdrew including the public defender, winding up with a sentence of 18 years in prison, served concurrently. All his other sentences were also ran concurrently leaving him with a 12 year sentence, normally two to three years in prison.
But Talley is an overachiever, about seven weeks after his previous arrest Talley was arrested once again in Kingfisher county, CM-2015-00266 , for domestic assault and battery. $941.00 in fines, fees, and costs along with one year in the county jail served concurrently with his other sentences. Another failure to appear, bail bonds, and indigent attorneys working on his case.
In October 2015 Talley gets his second protective order filed against him. $153.00 in costs left unpaid, and he is ordered to stay away from is minor child.
In July Talley gets arrested on more felony charges, CF-2016-00063 , drug possession again, sentence is 10 years in prison served concurrently with the other sentences. $1339.00 in fines and fees. In May of 2017 Talley is in prison.
While out on bond Talley is arrested again in September of 2016, another DUI, driving with suspended/revoked license, failure to have insurance, and failure to buy tags.$2310.00 in fines and fees, five years in prison, one year in county jail, all to serve concurrently with the half dozen other sentences.
So by May of 2017 Talley was safely behind bars and out of Kingfisher County. But he had been a busy boy elsewhere. In July of 2011 Talley had been arrested in Cleveland County, CM-2011-2050 , for driving with a suspended/revoked license. After a few delays Talley fails to show up for court and gets an arrest warrant out on him. He does this the next year too as the case drags on. Once he is brought before the court he gets a one year jail sentence suspended, one year of D.A. Supervision, and fines and costs. He refuses to show up of course and is arrested for failure to appear, posts bond, doesn't show up again, gets his suspended sentence revoked for failing to appear and failing to pay for the D.A. Supervision. He pays one payment for $86.24 and appears to have been on the run with that last warrant out for his arrest. His fines and fees after all of this was $1352.00, unpaid other than that one $86.24 payment.
And in April of 2012 Canadian County arrested him on a felony, CF-2012-231 , another three year long case, leaving the scene of a non injury accident. $3753.00 in costs, none of it paid according to the records online.
Then in January of 2016 Talley is arrested again in Canadian County, CF-2016-50 a felony, aggravated DUI and driving with a suspended license. $6555.00 in fines, fees, costs, and incarceration fees. By September his appointed attorney has withdrawn and Talley is failing to appear in court. Of course by this time Talley is in the John Tilley Correction Center so they have to haul his butt to court where he pleads out to four years in prison, served concurrently with the other four felonies, and one year in jail, also served at the same time, and the costs. After Talley was released in 2019 he was called and notified that he had six months to appear for a court hearing on his payment plan for the $6550.00 in debt to the court.
Look at the shear amount of time and trouble to attempt to keep this drunken drug abuser off the roads. Tens of thousands of dollars in prosecution and court resources, two instances of fleeing the scene of an accident, multiple DUI, somewhere around six to eight charges of driving with a suspended/revoked license, plus the multiple domestic assault and battery charges against him. And after about eight years of the courts treating him with kid gloves he finally goes to prison only to serve out less than the 36 years of sentences by serving all concurrently. Then he is turned out early because he is a “non violent offender”, with multiple assault and battery and drunk driving convictions?
Once a criminal decides to live a life of crime only the first arrest counts as the multiple crimes they commit do not add much if anything to the sentences. That is the problem with serving concurrent sentences, only one crime is punished,, and at about one sixth or less of the time actually served in prison.
Yes, the courts and D.A.s attempt to fleece the sheep but few are paying. A lot of these guys are working day labor at a place like Labor Ready or another temp staffing service. They claim they are unemployed when in court or they sell drugs on the side or commit property crimes to pay their way through life.
Now Earl Ray Talley sits in the Payne County jail on $10,000 bond. On Tuesday he will face a judge and expect at least two to four years for this case to drag out. Talley never learned from anything that the justice system threw at him, the liberals want to turn him out of jail without bond so he can continue to endanger others, how will society ever turn a man like this around?
