Sheriff Stanley Glanz says he must use public funds for outside counsel to challenge petition

Sheriff Stanley Glanz says he has no choice but to use public dollars to challenge a grassroots effort to oust him from his elected position.

The sheriff has an agenda item for county commissioners to approve Monday noting that he has retained outside counsel for matters that he said involve the petition for a grand jury inquiry into his office and “whatever may come.”

Glanz told the Tulsa World on Thursday that his hand is forced because he isn’t receiving counsel from the Tulsa County District Attorney’s Office. Glanz said he needs help navigating “all these challenges” facing him.

Under most circumstances, the District Attorney’s Office represents any elected county official who is sued or faces legal issues during the course of his or her job.

District Attorney Steve Kunzweiler said civil counsel in his office have been in communication with lawyers at the Sheriff’s Office to answer their questions, but he said he technically can’t be involved at this point (challenging the petition) because he doesn’t have jurisdiction until the court issues an order impaneling a grand jury.

Kunzweiler said his staff advised the Sheriff’s Office it has two options in its challenge of the petition — use outside counsel or ask Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt to act as legal representation.

Kunzweiler said the agenda item is a clear indication that the Sheriff’s Office has chosen the first of the two options.

It wasn’t immediately known late Thursday whether the state Attorney General’s Office had been contacted by the Sheriff’s Office.

Kunzweiler said a decision on whether he will recuse his office from the petition case won’t be made unless a grand jury is ordered.

Kunzweiler already has recused himself from the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation probe of the Sheriff's Office that he asked the agency to conduct. He said he asked to be recused to avoid any perception that his defense of the office in the past, as the attorney for Tulsa County officials, would affect the investigation.

Kunzweiler isn't seeking to be recused from the case of former Tulsa County Reserve Deputy Robert Bates, who he charged with second-degree manslaughter in the April 2 fatal shooting of Eric Harris.

A hearing on Glanz’s motion to dismiss the petition has been scheduled for 10 a.m. Tuesday. The petition was verified this week to contain enough signatures to call a grand jury, but the motion will be heard by the presiding judge before an order will be filed to convene grand jurors.

Glanz said he is “a little frustrated with everything that’s going on” and is contesting the petition because its circulators “need to follow the law.”

“You read the law and follow it, just as I have to do every day as sheriff,” Glanz said. “And I do that, by the way.”

The grassroots group We the People Oklahoma began circulating the petition calling for a grand jury investigation in May. The effort is a response to Glanz’s not stepping down after an internal Sheriff’s Office report that included allegations of falsified records, intimidation and special treatment benefiting Bates was leaked to the media.

Glanz said the funds that will go to the Tulsa-based law firm of McDonald, McCann, Metcalf and Carwile will come from the Sheriff’s Office’s fee account. That account includes money from drug or property seizures and contracted work.

Glanz said it’s a routine move when the District Attorney’s Office isn’t involved.

“I don’t have any choice,” Glanz said.

The agenda item is listed under “Agreements,” which county spokesman Michael Willis said are generally “clearing house” items. Typically, he said, the funding source already has been identified and the commissioners’ votes are a matter of deciding whether the agreement is lawful and appropriate.