MUSKOGEE – After 25 years a man who brutally killed a victim in rural Mc-Intosh County was convicted of second-degree murder last week in federal court in Muskogee.
Patrick Dwayne Murphy, 52, of Vernon, was sentenced to life in prison for second degree murder in Indian Country, murder in Indian Country in Perpetration of Kidnapping and Kidnapping Resulting in Death.
Investigators said Murphy and two others attacked the victim, George Jacobs Sr. 49, on Aug. 28, 1999.
Murphy stabbed, mutilated, and killed the victim with a knife.
A McIntosh County jury convicted Murphy in April 2000 and sentenced him to death.
Murphy, a member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, appealed the conviction, arguing that the State of Oklahoma had no right to prosecute based on the Mc-Girt ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court.
He won his appeal and then was tried in federal court.
On May 10, 2022, Murphy was sentenced to life on all three charges. In May 2024, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals vacated the kidnapping convictions and remanded the case for resentencing on the second-degree murder conviction.
The Honorable Ronald A. White, Chief District U.S. Judge in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma, presided over the resentencing hearing. Murphy will remain in the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service pending transportation to a designated United States Bureau of Prisons facility to serve a non-paroleable sentence of incarceration.
