Source: Office of United States Attorneys
MUSKOGEE, OKLAHOMA – The United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Oklahoma announced that Thomas Raymond Phillips, III, age 36, of Fort Towson, Oklahoma, was sentenced to a term of life in prison for First Degree Murder in Indian Country. Phillips was also sentenced to 120 months in prison for one count of Use, Carry, Brandish, and Discharge of a Firearm During and In Relation to a Crime of Violence. The sentences are set to be served consecutively.
The charges arose from an investigation by the Choctaw County Sheriff’s Office, the Oklahoma Highway Patrol, the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
On October 25, 2023, Phillips was found guilty of the charges by a federal jury at trial. According to investigators, on the evening of December 19, 2020, Phillips fired multiple shots into a Fort Towson bar after being ejected by management for instigating a fight. One bullet struck a patron, killing the victim at the scene. The crime occurred in Choctaw County, within the boundaries of the Choctaw Nation Reservation, in the Eastern District of Oklahoma.
“The defendant’s malicious and senseless acts stole a life, and the defendant will spend his remaining days in prison paying the price justice demands for his crimes,” said United States Attorney Christopher J. Wilson. “I commend county, state, and federal law enforcement for their investigative work and the prosecuting attorneys for presenting the case and advocating for the victim.”
The Honorable John F. Heil, III, U.S. District Judge in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma, presided over the hearing. Phillips 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.
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Dean Burris and T. Cameron McEwen represented the United States.