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Bates Shooting Costs Tulsa County Taxpayers $143,000 And Counting

Tulsa County reserve deputy Bob Bates (center) stands outside the David L. Moss Criminal Justice Center with his attorney, Clark Brewster, after turning himself in April 14, 2015.
Matt Trotter
/
KWGS Public Radio Tulsa
Tulsa County reserve deputy Bob Bates (center) stands outside the David L. Moss Criminal Justice Center with his attorney, Clark Brewster, after turning himself in April 14.

Tulsa County taxpayers have foot the bill for more than $143,000 related to the April 2 shooting of Eric Harris by former reserve sheriff’s deputy Robert Bates.

The county has spent money on an outside agency’s review of the Tulsa County Sheriff’s Office, a grand jury investigation, the legal fees for Sheriff Stanley Glanz’s successful effort to block that panel, and legal fees for Bates.

Bates has been charged with second-degree manslaughter after shooting Harris, who was unarmed. Bates says he mistook his service revolver for his stun gun as other deputies restrained Harris, who fled during a drug sting.

The #31,956 in fees for Bates’ legal counsel mostly came before Tulsa County District Attorney Steve Kunzweiler filed charges. Bates paid for his defense out of his own pocket after being charged.

The costs could rise even higher, according to The Tulsa World:

That total jumps to about $185,000 when an estimated cost for reserve deputies not working the 2015 Tulsa State Fair is added in. The reserve program was indefinitely suspended in May in the wake of the Harris shooting. . . . The figures don’t include the yet-to-be-determined cost of a special election to pick a sheriff to fill Glanz’s unfinished seventh term. Election expenses are evenly shared among entities holding votes on a given date, with election board officials stating countywide elections cost well more than $100,000. More legal billings are yet to be released regarding Glanz’s fight to toss out the grand jury petition that sought to investigate operations of his office as part of a grassroots effort to oust him. Additionally, a pending civil rights lawsuit against Glanz and others seeks in excess of $75,000 in punitive damages for each of three plaintiffs, two of whom are tied to Bates. A third plaintiff is unrelated to Bates.

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Brian Hardzinski is from Flower Mound, Texas and a graduate of the University of Oklahoma. He began his career at KGOU as a student intern, joining KGOU full time in 2009 as Operations and Public Service Announcement Director. He began regularly hosting Morning Edition in 2014, and became the station's first Digital News Editor in 2015-16. Brian’s work at KGOU has been honored by Public Radio News Directors Incorporated (PRNDI), the Oklahoma Association of Broadcasters, the Oklahoma Associated Press Broadcasters, and local and regional chapters of the Society of Professional Journalists. Brian enjoys competing in triathlons, distance running, playing tennis, and entertaining his rambunctious Boston Terrier, Bucky.
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