Tulsa Attorney Blog
What is Medical Parole (Compassionate Release) in Oklahoma?
Oklahoma does have a special type of parole for those that are having health conditions. And essentially it is eligible to people who are deemed no threat or no longer a threat to public safety or are dying or near dying. But the process to get such a parole is pretty convoluted and there are some exclusions. So the first exclusion is statutory. Read more »Advanced Age Parole: Who Qualifies Under Oklahoma Law?
To qualify for being considered for advanced age release, you must have served at least 10 years of your sentence and be at least 60 years old, or served, if you haven't served 10 years of sentence, served at least one third the length of your sentence. Under those two requirements, if you meet that and your offense is not certain violent offenses or sex offenses, then you could be eligible for advanced age release. When you want to request that, you can file a motion, it's automatically put on the next available pardon and parole board hearing. Read more »How to Deal with a Passport Hold from Past Due Child Support in Oklahoma
This is governed by two different laws. We've got federal law at play and we've got state law at play. Federal law at a 42 USC 652, deals with a system and creates a system to help states enforce child support obligations by allowing them to put a hold or revoke somebody's passport to prevent their international travel or to prevent them from fleeing. Read more »How to Enforce Oklahoma Child Support Through Garnishment
In Oklahoma, there's a lot of different ways to enforce child support. You can do a contempt, you can take a driver's license, you could put a hold on a passport, you can take some garnish a bank account, you can take money from a tax return, a lot of different things you can do. But one of the best ways, if you've got a parent or other person that owes you child support that is working where their payroll and goes through, whether it's in Oklahoma or whether it's working in another state, that's the best way to enforce child support at least initially. Read more »Enforcing Child Support Through Contempt of Court in Oklahoma
There's a lot of different ways that you can collect child support in Oklahoma and some are better in different circumstances. So if you've got somebody that's working at a job and going through payroll, first thing you probably want to do is get an income assignment, garnish that. Read more »Can You Enforce Oklahoma Child Support Through Tax Refund Intercept?
If there's an arrearage of at least $150 and TANF is involved, or at least $500 in arrearages on child support, and it's a SoonerCare case, then DHS can make the request to the federal government to withhold somebody's tax return and send it to you. Read more »License Revoked for Non-Payment of Child Support? Here's What to Do.
First off, if you're behind on child support for 90 days or more, the equivalent of an amount owed in arrearage of 90 days of more of support, then the state of Oklahoma through DHS Child Support Services, or the person that you're paying child support to or owed child support to can make the request that your driver's license be suspended. Read more »Enforcing Child Support in Oklahoma through Loss of Professional License
In Oklahoma, there's lots of different mechanisms to try to enforce child support, different things are good for different circumstances. In this case, we're talking about somebody who has a professional license, so maybe they're a doctor and RN or otherwise work in a licensed medical profession. Read more »Enforcing Child Support in Oklahoma Through Loss of Driver's License
If somebody has an order in place for child support, and they're not paying it, and they have an arrearage that is equal to up to 90 days of back due child support, then you could request that their driver's license be suspended, and the court can grant that request and they will lose their driving privileges. Read more »How to Enforce Child Support in Oklahoma through a Passport Hold
If you've got a child support obligation that is owed to you and it is past due, there's numerous different avenues to try to collect it. You could try to garnish wages, levy bank accounts. You can put a hold on state issued driver's licenses. You can do a contempt citation. You can try to intercept taxes. Read more »How to Get a Modification Through your Ex's Tax Return and Paystubs Every Year
If their income has gone up a lot, it may maybe worthwhile to do so. If your income has gone down, you're going to know it, but you're not going to know if theirs goes up unless you do this on a regular basis. So, if you need help doing that, or have a child support question, or want to file for a modification, talk to an attorney, you can talk to somebody at my office by going to makelaweasy.com. Read more »Who Gets the Dog?
Now, the dog is not treated like a child and family courts. So, there is no best interest of the dog analysis in Oklahoma. The dog is considered a piece of property. So, first and foremost, in the context of marriage, if you bought the dog before you came into the marriage, the dog's going to be yours. On the flip side, if she bought the dog before the marriage, it's hers. It's more complicated if the dog was purchased during the marriage. Read more »One Thing to Check on Your Phone when Starting a Family Law Case
First thing when you're starting your family law case, pull up your phone, see what you have your ex in your phone as, and change that name to something appropriate and descriptive. And that way, when you're printing off screenshots of all those text messages, it's going to be something that I can present to a court and that I'm not going to be embarrassed to provide and not going to be something that undermines your case and makes you look petty. Read more »What Can Grandparent Do about Domestic Violence? Domestic Violence Pt 5
Let's say your daughter is married and has two or three children, and over the course of several years it becomes apparent that your daughter is being abused by her spouse.Unfortunately a scenario that many grandparents across the State of Oklahoma find themselves in and it's hard to know what to do. Obviously the first thing that you want to do is you try to reach out to your daughter. You try to provide them with resources and help. It might be a mistake to provide marriage counseling as the first option and it's a mistake I've seen a lot of people make. When someone is being abused physically and mentally by a partner, marriage counseling towards reconciliation is not where you need to go. Read more »Entering a Plea: Step 10 in an Oklahoma Misdemeanor Case
This stage could happen any time during the process. Anytime if an agreement is worked out with the state for a plea deal that can be entered on the next court docket, or you could even sometimes make a special setting where you added on to get that plea deal entered. Read more »The Great Escape Leaving Domestic Violence: Domestic Violence Pt 4
In family law in State of the Oklahoma, evidence of domestic abuse creates a presumption that it's not in the best interest of the child for the abusive parent to be the primary caretaker, and that it's in fact in the best interest for the abused victim to be the primary caretaker of the child. So that gives you a built-in advantage litigating custody. Read more »Sentencing: Step #9 in an Oklahoma Misdemeanor Case
Often, if you were found guilty, often on a misdemeanor, you might have credit for time served, you might not get any jail time at all, and it might just be resolved at that time, or maybe the judge does order a little bit of jail time or something. Maximum on a misdemeanor is up to a year in jail, depending on what the offense is. Sometimes the judges will sentence you immediately after the trial. Other times, they'll set it off for sentencing on another date. Read more »Trial: Step #8 in an Oklahoma Misdemeanor Criminal Case
Sometimes it's a bench trial. Sometimes it's a jury trial. If you're talking about a misdemeanor as a jury trial, we're looking at six jurors. And you've got a right to a jury trial so you can demand that. But courts have also found that the state has a right to a jury trial. Sometimes the defendant would waive it and the state would want a jury trial and you ended up at a jury trial. But either way, it's going to be one or the other, and essentially that means that you're going to be putting on witnesses, exhibits, get the testimony in there. And then somebody is going to be making a determination on one, whether there's guilt, meaning whether each of the elements of the offense has been proven beyond a reasonable doubt, and two, what the sentence should be within the range of punishment. Read more »Its All My Fault - How Violence Impacts Children: Domestic Violence Pt 3
Children encounter domestic violence visually. Normally these children, they see the the effects of domestic violence. Either they see the actual incident occur itself or they see the aftermath such as bruising on one of the partners, and the children internalize this. It creates an atmosphere of violence in the house. Read more »Pre-Trial: Stage 7 in an Oklahoma Misdemeanor Case
Generally, the pretrial is all about the preparations that need to be made before you go before a judge for a bench trial or a jury for a jury trial. So it's the judge ensuring that we've got everything set and everything's ready to go, so we don't run into issues at that time. If you are the defense or even the state, it's about getting ruling on certain evidentiary hearings. It's about determining whether we have a complete list of witnesses ready to go. It's about pretrial motions, like motions in limine, which is making rulings on admissibility. Read more »Why Doesn't She Just Leave: Domestic Violence Pt 2
"Why doesn't she just leave him," is such an unfair one is that it very much over simplifies the process of leaving your abuser, because that abuser has erected a series of supports that helps he or she to control their victim. Because as we've discussed in the previous installment, violence is a means into the end. The end that the abuser is seeking is control. Maybe it's because of their own insecurities, but they want control over their partner's everyday life to the extent that no one else has a say in that person's life and the victim is forced to rely entirely on the abuser. And that's part of why it is so difficult to escape these situations. Read more »Domestic Violence and Child Custody: Domestic Violence Pt 1
Domestic violence is an incredibly common situation that folks find themselves in, and it involves adult intimate partners perpetrating violent acts against each other, and using physical and emotional coercion to control the other party. Now, according to statistics that I'm going to cite to you from the Domestic Violence Manual for Child Welfare Specialists provided by Oklahoma DHS in March 2018... They were sourced by the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence originally in a study that was done some time ago, and those statistics are pretty astounding: One in four women at some point in their life will suffer from domestic violence, which could mean stalking or sexual violence or physical assault. Read more »Motion Hearing: Stage 6 in an Oklahoma Misdemeanor Case
So you've already gone through your arraignment. You've had your status conference, tried to work out a deal with the prosecutor, nothing going there, or there's other issues that you want to address. Perhaps you already went on to make sure the discovery is complete, and then we're talking about motions. Technically, some of these motions sometimes are filed earlier, but sometimes they're filed at this time. So it's not always perfect that everything is one, two, three, four, five, six; because for number six for the motion hearing, sometimes it's earlier, sometimes it's not, depending on the type of motion. Sometimes you want to file a demurrer. And when you're filing a demurrer, essentially you're alleging that the charging document, the information, which is the formal name for the charging document, doesn't even specifically list a crime. In that case, you file a demurrer and try to get it dismissed earlier on, probably directly after the arraignment or at the time of the arraignment. Read more »Discovery Hearing: Stage #5 in an Oklahoma Misdemeanor Case
A lot of times we don't get what we're supposed to though and then it becomes a battle where you're arguing with the prosecutor over it and trying to convince the judge to dismiss the case or to provide some sort of sanction because there's materials out there that should have been provided and have not been provided and we've gotten cases dismissed on those grounds at the Allen hearing. Read more »Status Conference: Stage #4 in an Oklahoma Misdemeanor Case
A status conference comes directly after the arraignment. It's the first docket after the arraignment. It goes by different names. It seems like every court calls it something different. Could be a conference docket, sounding docket, status conference docket. But whatever you call it, pretty much the same sort of thing happens. Read more »
