imagine living in a country like North Korea where if you publish stories that are unfavorable to your government you're likely to be investigated by police probably thrown in jail and worst case scenario possibly even just outright murdered luckily we live in the United States of America where we have free press and the freedom to criticize our government so no journalist would ever have their life threatened by the government for exposing the government's misdeeds or so you thought several mccurtain County Employees to include the county sheriff this after secret recordings allegedly captured them talking about beating killing and burying two newspaper reporters in Idabel those conversations shared with News 9 the reporter telling our Dan Stein he fears for his life the County's plot to murder reporters was discovered by Bruce Willingham when he placed a recording device inside of the county commissioner's meeting room because he believed that the commission was holding secret meetings which were a violation of the public meetings act which says that all meetings must be public that the public must be informed of the meetings and that the public must be allowed to attend the meetings he wasn't at all surprised to find out that his recorder did pick up a secret meeting that was held by the County Commission and the sheriff's department he was however surprised to find out the details of what they talked about in that meeting including plotting to murder him and his son as well as discussions about how they would dispose of the bodies I was breathless I just I I couldn't believe it I was expecting it you know chitter chatter stuff about County Business and stuff and and that's how it started and then it got down to the extremely serious stuff on the recordings we can hear Commissioners Jeff Jennings and Robert back as well as the elected Sheriff Kevin Clarity and sheriff's deputy Alicia Manning [Applause] thank you in Louisiana because it was all Market ready goes around it it will I told you it will yeah well I know where two big deep holes are here Bruce Willingham and his son don't know for sure why County officials want him murdered but they're suspicious that it may be because of a story that they ran on the sheriff's department where Deputy Matt casbahn tased a man to death while he was hogtied we asked some questions about that they refused to give us any records at all initially we've now gotten everything we've asked for but we had to file lawsuit to get but plotting the deaths of news reporters wasn't the only thing that was talked about in this unofficial official meeting they also talked about how they believed that black folks should be taken down to the nearby River and hung local officials including Mayors and the Governor of Oklahoma are calling for the resignation of all the public officials involved and the FBI is investigating this as a criminal case residents of the area have been protesting outside of the commission Hall ever since the audio was released and tonight will be the first official County Commission meeting since the audio was released and to the general public the comments made in this meeting may come as a surprise eyes but to those of us who have been pushing for government accountability and especially police accountability over the years we've already been promised by police Union Joe gamaldi that they are coming for us in this chilling threat four years ago but now I want to speak on behalf of the 5200 brave men and women of the Houston Police Department and the other 800 000 police officers that'll work in these streets every single day putting their lives on the line we are sick and tired of having Targets on our back we are sick and tired of having dirt bags trying to take our lives when all we're trying to do is protect this community and protect our families enough is enough and if you're the ones that are out there spreading the rhetoric that police officers are the enemy well just know we've all got your number now we're going to be keeping track all y'all and we're going to make sure that we hold you accountable every time you stir the pot on our police officers we've had enough folks this comment from Joe gamaldi came four years ago in Houston Texas after a botched raid on the wrong house five officers ended up being shot in that raid and Joe gamaldi was trying to claim that the homeowners had shot the police it was later determined that the homeowners never fired a single shot and that the police had murdered both the two individuals in the home and shot each other all five police officers were shot by other police officers but he blamed the shooting of his five officers on news reporters and activists that exposed bad cops claiming that exposing the truth about police conduct puts a Target on their back it's my opinion that the plot to murder news reporters in Oklahoma very well could have been inspired by the threats made by police Union Vice President Joe gamaldi four years ago and if you're the ones that are out there spreading the rhetoric that police officers are the enemy well just know we've all got your number now we're going to be keeping track all y'all and we're going to make sure that we hold you accountable every time you stir the pot on our police officers we've had enough folks