Temporary stay issued in circuit court's ruling on ticketing Natives

Jul. 26—The nation's highest court on Wednesday issued a temporary stay on a federal circuit court's ruling to stop cities in the eastern half of Oklahoma from issuing traffic citations to Native Americans.

The 10th Circuit Court of Appeals' mandate in Hooper v. Tulsa went into effect July 19 after judges denied the city of Tulsa's request for a delay to allow time to file an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court.

U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch issued the temporary stay Wednesday against the circuit court's rejection of Tulsa's argument that city officers could still prosecute Native Americans for municipal violations, despite the Supreme Court's ruling in McGirt v. Oklahoma. Tulsa claims Section 14 of the Curtis Act, a law from 1898 that predates Oklahoma's statehood, gave the city that authority.

The 10th Circuit ruled the Act only applied to Tulsa prior to Oklahoma's statehood, when the city operated under Arkansas law, and that it "no longer applied" in modern times.

Gorsuch, who wrote the landmark opinion in McGirt, stayed the mandate until Aug. 2 at 4 p.m. CDT after Tulsa filed an appeal with the court Monday.

The case began after Justin Hooper, a member of the Choctaw Nation, was fined $150 for a traffic violation in 2018 by the Tulsa Police Department. Hooper sought resolution by filing for post-conviction relief following the 2020 decision in McGirt v. Oklahoma, which stated the Muscogee (Creek) Nation was never disestablished and therefore the state of Oklahoma did not have criminal jurisdiction over crimes committed by Native Americans.

The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals has since applied the ruling to seven other tribal nations in eastern Oklahoma.

The city argued the Curtis Act gave the city the authority to prosecute municipal violations committed by Native Americans.

A Tulsa municipal judge and a federal judge for the Northern District of Oklahoma ruled against Hooper before the 10th Circuit decided in Hooper's favor and issued a mandate for the lower district court to reverse its judgment.

Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt has since launched a website claiming traffic laws will no longer apply uniformly within tribal boundaries and that the decision puts public safety at risk.

"If a man with Indian heritage is not subject to the traffic laws and justice system of Tulsa, Oklahoma, what laws must he follow?" Stitt says in the video posted to the One Oklahoma website. "We can't let special interests dictate Oklahoma's future."

Tribal leaders have pressed back against Stitt, calling called his rhetoric of misinformation "dangerous" and saying tribal members who break the law will still face the consequences within their tribal court systems, as long as cities like Tulsa honor cross-deputization agreements and forward the citations for prosecution.

Tulsa claims the cross-deputization agreements are not the "magic cure" and states tribal members have been confronting and challenging officers during traffic stops.

The city gave two examples — one from July 14 and the other from July 18 — with video links of tribal members arguing with officers over the Tulsa Police Department's authority to stop their vehicles.

Tulsa also argues Hooper is not a member of the tribal nation within which the city is located, and the city asserts "concurrent, not exclusive, jurisdiction over Mr. Hooper, as a city of Tulsa resident and non-member Indian."

Attorneys for Hooper are ordered to have a response to Tulsa's arguments by noon EDT July 31.