The United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Oklahoma announced today that William Clayton Brown, age 40, of Eufaula, Oklahoma, was sentenced to consecutive life sentences in prison for one count of First Degree Murder in Indian Country and one count of Second Degree Murder in Indian Country.

The charges arose from investigations by the Eufaula Police Department, the District 25 Violent Crime Task Force, the Oklahoma Department of Corrections Office of Fugitive Apprehension and Investigations, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

On September 1, 2021, Brown was found guilty by a federal jury of Second Degree Murder in Indian Country. During the trial, the medical examiner testified Brown fatally stabbed a victim with a sharp instrument. Further testimony revealed Brown attempted to hide the victim’s body in a field.

On July 7, 2022, a federal jury found Brown guilty of First Degree Murder in Indian Country. During the trial, witnesses testified that while in the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester, Brown killed a second victim in a cell, strangling him with a ligature before beating him and suffocating him with plastic bags.

“William Brown has proven he is a hardened and violent criminal, and a true menace to society,” said FBI Oklahoma City Special Agent in Charge Edward J. Gray. “For the lives he took and the families he affected, he has duly earned each of his life sentences. Thanks to the efforts of the FBI and our law enforcement partners, Brown will never again endanger the citizens of Oklahoma.”

“The defendant is obviously an extremely violent person and the consecutive life sentences imposed by the Court were fitting punishment for his heinous crimes,” said United States Attorney Christopher J. Wilson.

The United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Oklahoma prosecuted these cases because the defendant is a member of a federally recognized Indian tribe and the crimes occurred in McIntosh and Pittsburg Counties, which are within the boundaries of the Creek and Choctaw Nation Reservations, respectively, and within the Eastern District of Oklahoma.

The Honorable David C. Joseph, U.S. District Judge in the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana, sitting by designation, presided over the September 2021 trial and the sentencing hearings in Muskogee, Oklahoma.

The Honorable Jodi W. Dishman, U.S. District Judge in the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma, sitting by assignment, presided over the July 2022 trial in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

Brown will remain in the custody of the U.S. Marshal pending transportation to a designated United States Bureau of Prisons facility to serve non-paroleable sentences of incarceration.

Assistant United States Attorney T. Cameron McEwen represented the United States.