HENRYETTA, Okla. – Mvskoke citizen Patrick Dwayne Murphy has been resentenced to life in prison for second degree murder in Indian Country on Nov. 19. Murphy was previously charged and convicted of Second Degree Murder in Indian Country, Murder in Indian Country in Perpetration of Kidnapping and Kidnapping Resulting in Death in 2022 for the 1999 murder of George Jacobs in McIntosh County. Jacobs was found beaten, stabbed and mutilated in a rural area. Murphy’s case was remanded from the circuit court to the district court in June.
These charges come from an investigation by the McIntosh County Sheriff’s Department, the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Murphy was initially tried and convicted in 2000 in the District Court of McIntosh County. This conviction would be challenged, arguing the State of Oklahoma did not have the jurisdiction to prosecute Murphy because he is a citizen of a federally-recognized tribe that committed a crime on the MCN Reservation. The challenge resulted in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit vacating the conviction. That decision was appealed by the State of Oklahoma. While the U.S. Supreme Court considered Oklahoma’s appeal, the Court handed down its decision in McGirt. v. Oklahoma, the historic ruling that reestablished the MCN Reservation as “Indian Country”.
The defendant at the center of the McGirt case, convicted child rapist Jimcy McGirt, based his appeal on Murphy’s argument. Both cases were instrumental in the Supreme Court’s decision that the MCN Reservation was never disestablished. Following the McGirt Decision, Murphy’s criminal case was refiled in July 2020.
According to the United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Oklahoma, Murphy will remain in the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service pending transportation to a United States Bureau of Prisons facility to serve the rest of his sentence. Murphy is ineligible for parole.
