What Skeptics Ask
People who hear about this case for the first time tend to raise the same objections. They’re reasonable ones. Each is answered below from the trial record, the police files and later sworn testimony, with links to the pages that set out the evidence in full.
“Thirteen women can’t all be lying.”
They weren’t thirteen women who walked into a police station. Only four came forward before detectives approached them: Jannie Ligons, Terri Morris, and, after the news coverage, Shardayreon Hill and Kala Lyles. Detectives found the other nine. A lieutenant pulled the names of women Daniel had run on patrol, screened them for drug or prostitution histories, and started with Black women. Detectives then went door to door and opened by saying they had a “tip” that the woman might have been sexually assaulted by an officer. Usually there was no tip. By Detective Kim Davis’s count, thirty-four women told them nothing had happened. Scott Adams 01001; Trial Tr. 2385–88, 2423:15–2424:19; Davis Dep. 249:17–250:6 (Jan. 29, 2019).
And they weren’t thirteen strangers. Terri Morris had known Kala Lyles for many years
before either went to police. Florene Mathis cleaned Tabitha Barnes’s house and sometimes stayed the night. Rosetta Grate is the one who pointed detectives to Syrita Bowen. And Grate said she had seen a couple of the other women around because we went to the same crack spot quite often.
Morris Dep. 43:3–13 (Dec. 13, 2018); Trial Tr. 2325:2–17; Scott Adams 00859, 00873; Grate Dep. 69:22–70:24 (Mar. 22, 2021).
Nor did the jury convict on all thirteen. It acquitted Daniel of every count involving five of them, including three of the four women who came forward on their own. Of eight more accusations that never reached trial, the prosecutors themselves listed two as false reports, and one of those accusers admitted she had “made the entire story up” and pleaded guilty to false reporting. And two of the women whose accounts the jury did accept later undercut them under oath, in lawsuits they brought themselves: in 2018 Tabitha Barnes said Daniel never touched her, though she still said he made her expose herself, and in 2021 Sherry Ellis said she had never seen him before trial, though she still named him as the man. Trial Tr. 4323–26 (verdicts); Scott Adams 02935–36, 02767–68; Oklahoma County No. CM-2015-1413; Barnes Dep. 77:23–78:4, 136:9–137:12 (Oct. 30, 2018); Ellis Dep. 54:12–55:11, 62:17–64:13 (Mar. 19, 2021).
“Ligons reported it the same night.”
She did, and hers is the only allegation with a record from the night itself. It is also the one the physical evidence speaks to most directly, and the evidence doesn’t support it. Daniel admitted the stop from the start and denied that anything sexual happened, so the question is what happened during it. She described a white man, 35 to 45, 5′7″ to 5′9″, with blonde hair parted on the right. Daniel was 27, half Japanese, over six feet tall, with black hair and no part. Her exam within hours found no sign of semen. None of her DNA was on the fly she said his penis came through, and the patrol car yielded no fingerprints or DNA profile attributed to her. Police built a photo lineup for her that afternoon and never showed it to her. Scott Adams 00064, 00070, 00072, 00126, 00239; Trial Tr. 1145; Forensic Examination Report SD-14-273, pp. 6–8 (Nov. 12, 2014); Trial Tr. 4038–39.
“One accuser’s DNA was on his pants.”
The State’s laboratory reported that it was. What the DNA can’t show is how or when it got there. It was a trace, in a mixture of several people’s DNA, at a level no higher than what a car door handle carries. The State’s analyst examined the fly under a bright light with a magnifying glass and saw nothing suspicious. The State never tested it for vaginal fluid. In a 2019 deposition the analyst said that before trial she had told the prosecutor there was “no way” she could tell whether the sample came from vaginal fluid or saliva. In closing, the prosecutor told the jury it came from “the walls of her vagina.” Supplemental Forensic Examination Report SD-14-273 (Oct. 7, 2015), Scott Adams 03597; Trial Tr. 4084:2–22, 4307:8–13; Taylor Dep. 128:21–129:22 (Jan. 15, 2019).
The same fly carried nothing from Jannie Ligons or Kala Lyles, though the State said both had sexual contact with Daniel through it within the same twenty-four hours. And by Gardner’s own account, Daniel went through her purse on June 17, the day before he handed over the pants. That contact needs no assault to explain it. A 2017 panel of forensic scientists that included Peter Gill concluded that the DNA had little probative value, because it could be explained by non-intimate transfer of skin cells. Forensic Examination Report SD-14-273, pp. 7–8; Trial Tr. 3757:2–15; Gill et al. (2017).
“His own records put him with every one of them.”
Nine of the thirteen women were chosen from his records, so the records were bound to put him with them. A record shows that a stop happened. It doesn’t show what happened during it. And where an account didn’t fit the records, the records won. Terri Morris’s date came from Daniel’s records, not from her; she testified, “It wasn’t May the 8th when I was violated.” Carla Raines told the detective it happened “last year,” in the summer; the State charged a date from Daniel’s records, and at trial she said the District Attorney’s office had told her the date “because I didn’t remember.” Regina Copeland was sure Daniel drove down 24th Street. The GPS shows he never did, and the detective agreed under oath. Rosetta Grate told detectives his car sat in her driveway at least 30 minutes.
The GPS has it at the house under ten. Morris Dep. 60:15–61:2 (Dec. 13, 2018); Gregory interview of Raines, Aug. 15, 2014 (audio); Scott Adams 00301–02; Trial Tr. 2184:2–10, 2205:17–22, 2925:5–20, 2933:20–2935:7; Davis–Homan video interview of Grate, Aug. 27, 2014; Scott Adams 00568.
And the accounts moved. Carla Johnson told the preliminary hearing that the officer had not penetrated her. In her 2018 deposition she said he put his finger inside her. Grate’s accounts of the drive, the gun and whether he ejaculated changed from one telling to the next. Adaira Gardner, whose stops the records place on June 17, first told a detective it happened in March or April. Prelim. Tr. Vol. II 112 (Nov. 18, 2014), Scott Adams 01826; Johnson Dep. 41:12–16 (Nov. 1, 2018); see Rosetta Grate and Adaira Gardner.
“He went after vulnerable Black women. That’s the pattern.”
That pattern was built into the search. Lt. Timothy Muzny had the women Daniel ran pulled from the records, screened the names for drug or prostitution histories, and began with Black women: “Specifically names of black females is initially what we started out looking for.” The women found that way were then offered to the jury as proof of whom Daniel chose. In closing, the prosecutor said he didn’t pick “CEOs or soccer moms.” Scott Adams 01001; Trial Tr. 2385–88, 4151.
The woman who started the case doesn’t fit the pattern. Jannie Ligons had no prostitution history, Daniel never ran her name, and her car’s windows were tinted so dark that Davis agreed you couldn’t see inside it in daylight. Nothing in the record shows he knew who was driving when he pulled her over. The stops themselves were the work his commanders asked for. In email after email, the Springlake Division told the officers on its overtime detail to be “VERY proactive”: stop cars, talk to people, pull warrants. Scott Adams 00022, 00061, 00098; Trial Tr. 1099; Jennings, “V.I.P.E.R. Overtime Program,” Feb. 1, 2013, OKC 6290, 6658; Jennings, Feb. 11, 2013, OKC 6942.
“He took women in his car to secluded places.”
That is how the prosecutors put it, telling the jury he took victims to secluded locations where he can sexually assault them.
Daniel described the same habit differently in his 2019 deposition. He treated the people he stopped as potential sources. He put them in the back seat to develop a rapport, talk to them, grab their intelligence,
and let people with city warrants go in return for what they knew. That was the proactive work his division asked for. Trial Tr. 4158:22–24; Holtzclaw Dep. 74:3–9, 134:12–25, 174:19–25 (Oct. 21, 2019).
That work couldn’t happen in plain view. The nature of the beast in that area is snitching,
Daniel said. The women said the same. Adaira Gardner told the preliminary hearing that snitches are a waste of life,
and when the prosecutor said people get mad, she answered, People get killed.
Kala Lyles said she turned down a ride from an officer because I don’t want to seem like I was a snitch.
Even Davis agreed that an officer giving someone a ride was not unheard of.
Holtzclaw Dep. 102:19–25; Prelim. Tr. Vol. I 211:5–19 (Nov. 17, 2014); Prelim. Tr. Vol. II 87:3–13 (Nov. 18, 2014); Tr. 2739:25–2740:2.
A ride or a conversation out of sight isn’t evidence of an assault. And Daniel radioed in the rides he gave Rosetta Grate and Regina Copeland.
“Why would these women make it up?”
UNCUFF doesn’t claim to know what was in any woman’s mind, and the case doesn’t turn on it. The question assumes each woman came to the police with a story. Most didn’t. Detectives came to them, said they had a tip, and kept going when a woman said no. Tabitha Barnes says Gregory told her he was investigating Daniel Holtzclaw for sexual assault before she had told him anything. Carla Raines said no at least five times before Gregory told her he was after “a really bad guy” with “lots of victims.” Only then did she describe a sexual assault. Barnes Dep. 82:3–17 (Oct. 30, 2018); Trial Tr. 2200, 2204–05.
False accusations against officers were nothing new to Davis. When Jannie Ligons’s complaint came in, The Oklahoman later reported, Davis expected it to come to nothing: “Almost once a month it seems the department gets a complaint like this against an officer,” and “Davis knows that most of the allegations prove false.” Of the dozen or so such cases she had investigated, none had led to charges. In this case the prosecutors’ own discovery list filed two reports under False Report.
Shaneice Barksdale contacted the Sex Crimes Unit after seeing the news and gave a written statement. She later admitted she had “made the entire story up” and pleaded guilty to false reporting. Terry Dunn told a patrol officer that Daniel had raped him on a day Daniel was off duty and wearing an ankle monitor in Enid. Dunn had seen Daniel’s picture on the news, rated his certainty that it was Daniel a 9 out of 10, and said he just wanted to help out the victims.
The State also declined to charge Daniel on the accusation of the woman the department called Victim #14, because she had said he wasn’t the man. UNCUFF believes the accusations the jury heard were false too. The Oklahoman (2016), as excerpted in “Hunting Holtzclaw,” Law Officer, June 9, 2016; DA discovery notice, Feb. 27, 2015, Scott Adams 02935–36; Scott Adams 02750–51, 02767–68; Oklahoma County No. CM-2015-1413.
Many of the women who testified also had something riding on their dealings with police when they made their allegations. Terri Morris had been arrested a week earlier and was in the county jail when, by Gregory’s report, she decided she wanted “to proceed in going all the way with the investigation.” He told her that whether she testified or not, he would check into rehab for her. Florene Mathis was in jail when Davis approached her. Rosetta Grate was in jail too, “looking for a ticket out,” as she later put it, and on a recording made a few days later Davis told her the prosecutor was checking on getting her into long-term rehab. Sherry Ellis was on probation and behind on her fines, and Davis told her she would call and “find what we can do.” And at least eleven of the thirteen women who testified sued the City and Daniel for damages. None of that proves any one woman lied. It does mean that “why would they?” isn’t evidence that Daniel did anything. VA Police arrest affidavit (July 3, 2014); Scott Adams 01427, 02018–20; Trial Tr. 2298, 2330; Grate Dep. 32:22–35:19 (Mar. 22, 2021); Grate Jail Interview Tr. 11–12 (Sept. 2, 2014); Davis interview of Ellis, Aug. 5, 2014 (video); Barnes v. City of Oklahoma City, No. CIV-16-184-HE (W.D. Okla.) (seven plaintiffs); Ellis v. Holtzclaw, No. CIV-15-0019-HE; Gardner v. Holtzclaw, No. CIV-16-0349-HE; Grate v. City of Oklahoma City, No. CIV-16-0412-HE (W.D. Okla.); Copeland Dep. 2 (Mar. 18, 2021).
“The jury heard the evidence and convicted him.”
The jury heard what it was given, and some of what matters most came out only after the verdict. Barnes’s and Ellis’s sworn statements came years later, in their own lawsuits. So did the analyst’s account of what the vaginal-fluid claim rested on. In her 2019 deposition she said she couldn’t say the DNA came from vaginal fluid, but nonsensically wouldn’t dispute the claim “because that was what the young woman testified to.” Barnes Dep. 77:23–78:4, 100:1–101:9 (Oct. 30, 2018); Ellis Dep. 62:17–64:13 (Mar. 19, 2021); Taylor Dep. 140:8–142:16 (Jan. 15, 2019).
The jury also decided all thirty-six counts in one trial. Afterward, one juror called the DNA, which concerned only Gardner, “very crucial.” Another said it helped get deliberations moving when some jurors had a hard time believing some of the accusers. The jurors reached those verdicts after hearing protesters chant during testimony, and the court refused to sequester them until deliberations. KOCO 5 News (Dec. 18, 2015); ABC News (May 20, 2016); Gill et al. (2017), p. 37; Trial Tr. 2303–21, 4315.
Prosecutors bootstrapped one accuser’s DNA across all 13 cases
“The appeals court upheld the convictions.”
It did, in 2019, and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear the case. The court decided the case on the trial record, plus affidavits filed with Daniel’s February 2017 brief. Its opinion mentions none of the evidence from the women’s civil lawsuits, all of which came later: Barnes’s 2018 testimony that he never touched her, the analyst’s 2019 account of what her vaginal-fluid opinion rested on, the 2019 depositions of the detectives and the lieutenant who ran the investigation, the department’s internal emails, including the lieutenant’s description of Barnes as “a perfect victim,” and Ellis’s 2021 testimony that she had never seen him before trial. His post-conviction case is pending. Holtzclaw v. State, 2019 OK CR 17, ¶¶ 48–65, 448 P.3d 1134; Holtzclaw v. Oklahoma, 140 S. Ct. 1296 (2020); Brief of Appellant, No. F-2016-62 (Feb. 1, 2017); Barnes Dep. (Oct. 30, 2018); Taylor Dep. (Jan. 15, 2019); Gregory Dep. (Jan. 17, 2019); Davis Dep. (Jan. 29, 2019); Muzny Dep. (Mar. 26, 2019); Ellis Dep. (Mar. 19, 2021); OKC Bates series, Holtzclaw-CIV-16-184-HE; Muzny email, Aug. 14, 2014, OKC 0103–04.
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