Comanche Nation Murderer To Remain On Death Row

A man convicted in a brutal double murder in Southwest Oklahoma will remain on death row.

Comanche Nation citizen, Mica Martinez, had appealed his conviction under the U.S. Supreme Court's McGirt ruling that found major crimes committed in Indian country by tribal citizens fall under the jurisdiction of the federal government.

The Comanche Nation agreed with the appeal arguing the federal government, not that the state of Oklahoma should have prosecuted the 2009 case on historical Southwest Oklahoma tribal lands.

It’s the same question, now answered for Eastern Oklahoma Tribes under McGirt.

Did Congress disestablish the Kiowa, Comanche, Apache reservation in the Southwest portion of the state?

This week, the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals said yes, the reservation was disestablished by Congress in 1900.

The Tribe argued the way it was done through the Jerome Agreement was a fraud, unilateral and lacked the required approval of three-fourths of adult male Indians.

The appeals court disagreed writing, "The Supreme Court long ago held that Congress’s actions respecting a reservation were wholly within the legislative power."

At the time of the 2009 attack, the Comanche County sheriff said it was one of the most brutal he'd ever seen. Fifty-five-year-old Martha Miller was beaten and raped in her home. Her husband, 64-year-old Carl Miller also beaten by Martinez, died at a Lawton Hospital.

“The state’s jurisdiction and sovereignty is under attack on all fronts. Oklahomans should know that a jigsaw puzzle of jurisdictions jeopardizes public safety and negatively effects all 4 million Oklahomans,” Carly Atchison, a spokeswoman for Gov. Kevin Stitt said in a statement.

The Comanche Nation and attorneys for Martinez did not respond to requests for comment.