Supreme Court Rules Nearly Half of Oklahoma Is Indian Reservation

The 5-to-4 decision could reshape criminal justice in eastern Oklahoma by preventing state authorities from prosecuting Native Americans.

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that nearly half of Oklahoma falls within an Indian reservation, a decision that could reshape the criminal-justice system by preventing state authorities from prosecuting offenses there that involve Native Americans.

The case was steeped in the United States government’s long history of brutal removals and broken treaties with Indigenous tribes, and grappled with whether lands of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation had remained a reservation after Oklahoma became a state.

“Today we are asked whether the land these treaties promised remains an Indian reservation for purposes of federal criminal law,” Justice Gorsuch wrote.

The tribe said it would work with state and federal law enforcement authorities to coordinate public safety within the reservation.

Roberts warned in a dissenting opinion that the Court had sown confusion in the state’s criminal justice system and “profoundly destabilized” the state’s powers in eastern Oklahoma.

The case concerned Jimcy McGirt, a member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation who was convicted of sex crimes against a child by state authorities in the Nation’s historical boundaries.

He said that only federal authorities were entitled to prosecute him.

Oklahoma, the court ruled, 5 to 4, that much of eastern Oklahoma is an Indian reservation.

18-9526, an appeal from a state court’s decision, was the Supreme Court’s second attempt to resolve the status of eastern Oklahoma

17-1107, which arose from the prosecution in state court of Patrick Murphy, a Creek Indian, for murdering George Jacobs in rural McIntosh County, east of Oklahoma City

Murphy argued that only the federal government could prosecute him and that a federal law barred the imposition of the death penalty because he was an Indian