KFOR.com Oklahoma City

Local family says relative stabbed over 30 times at Oklahoma County Detention Center, claims jail staff didn’t notify them

OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) – Investigators at the Oklahoma County Jail are investigating a stabbing that happened last week that left an inmate with dozens of stab wounds, according to his family.

“I was messaged from a guy, he has friends there, and he told me you need to check on your brother. He’s been stabbed,” Teon’Tre Murphy told KFOR.

That’s how Murphy said he learned that his brother was stabbed multiple times inside the Oklahoma County Detention Center last week.

“So I call Oklahoma County multiple times. They won’t talk to me. They won’t tell me anything,” Murphy said.

Murphy and his sister went to the jail, not sure if their brother was even alive at that point.

“They let me use the phone to call up to the medical unit. I called up to the medical unit off of their phone and she thought that I was a worker. So I asked about his condition and she said he’s in critical condition and she was like wait, who are you and I tell her, I’m his brother and she told me I can’t tell you anything and hung up the phone,” Murphy said.

Murphy told News 4 almost five days later he finally got a call but not from anyone in administration. It was his brother on the phone.

“He was stabbed over 30 times. He said from his neck to his knee he has stitches and staples,” said Murphy. “This is what’s crazy, they still have not reached out to me to tell me anything.”

Officials with the jail told News 4 in an email Monday night, “We did have an incident last week and I believe we did talk to several individuals with the victims family. There is only so much we can tell them at this time, but we did inform them he was being treated by medical staff. This is an ongoing investigation and there will be more information to be released. For security reasons there is only so much information we can divulge to family members. But when the investigation is complete, they will be able to get more information about what happened.”

The family insists that never happened. News 4 checked back in with officials Tuesday morning and they clarified that they spoke with the family when they showed up at the jail but did not call them initially because that is against protocol for safety reasons.

“Why did somebody else have to tell me? It shouldn’t be like this, you know?” Murphy said.

You might remember, last month, a judge approved District Attorney David Prater’s request for a grand jury investigation into how the jail is being operated. He told News 4 in a statement that the culture under the jail trust, which took over operations of the jail last July, “has resulted in more deaths and maltreatment of inmates than I have ever seen.”

“This is crazy. These are our loved ones. They’re not animals,” Murphy said.