Billy Zane DEO v. The Honorable Lawrence Parish, District Judge of Okfuskee, etc.

Okfuskee, Oklahoma second-degree burglary criminal defense lawyer reported the Defendant.

On August 15, 2018, Defendant entered a guilty plea to Second Degree Burglary in Case No. CF-2018-56 and the trial court entered an order deferring his sentencing for seven years. On December 17, 2018, Petitioner was charged with Grand Larceny and Knowingly Concealing Stolen Property in Case No. CF-2018-104. On December 19, 2018, the State filed an application to accelerate Petitioner's deferred sentencing in Case No. CF-2018-56. Pursuant to a drug court plea agreement, Petitioner entered a plea of guilty in Case No. CF-2018-104, stipulated to the application to accelerate in Case No. CF-2018-56, and was admitted to drug court in January of 2019. The trial court delayed sentencing in both cases pending the outcome of Petitioner's participation in drug court.

Deo v. Parish, 541 P.3d 833 (Okla. Crim. App. 2023)'



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¶5 Petitioner failed to raise his claim that the trial court lacks subject matter jurisdiction prior to entering his pleas. However, this Court has held that subject matter jurisdiction cannot be waived and can be raised at any time.

Cox v. State

, 2006 OK CR 51, ¶ 8, 152 P.3d 244, 248, overruled on other grounds by State v. Vincent , 2016 OK CR 7, ¶ 12, 371 P.3d 1127, 1130.



¶6 The question of our district courts' criminal subject matter jurisdiction was largely unimportant, a curiosity that was rarely, if ever, substantively dispositive prior to McGirt and especially after the lower courts were unified into one district court.2 However, it is now critically important that this Court analyze the question. Ultimately, in reviewing this Court's precedent, other courts' reasoning on similar issues, and the United States Supreme Court's treatment of jurisdiction in Indian Country, this Court is no longer satisfied that Oklahoma district courts' subject matter jurisdiction is implicated in the preemption analysis.

¶12 This Court is no longer convinced that Congress has preempted Oklahoma State Courts' subject matter jurisdiction.6 The Supreme Court even identified the question in Castro-Huerta as whether "the State's authority to prosecute crimes committed by non-Indians against Indians in Indian country has been preempted." Castro-Huerta , 597 U.S. 629, 142 S.Ct. at 2494 (emphasis added). Reading 18 U.S.C. §§ 1151 - 53 in concert with the Supreme Court's analysis in Castro-Huerta , it becomes clear that Congress has chosen to exercise its authority over a particular territory (Indian Country) and over a particular people (Indians), not a type of controversy, at most preempting Oklahoma's territorial and personal jurisdiction over Indians in Indian Country.

Deo v. Parish, 541 P.3d 833 (Okla. Crim. App. 2023)