Legal action over a disagreement between Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt and various tribes regarding gaming compacts has their price. Legal fees and other costs have exceeded $2 million to date.
Tribes filed suit on December 31 in federal court in Oklahoma City after the governor said their compacts were expiring and Class III gaming was thus illegal. The tribes argued the compacts renewed automatically. They won. Stitt chose not to appeal the ruling, according to Tulsa World.
“The expenses incurred were a result of lawsuits filed against the governor, not by him,” said Charlie Hannema, a Stitt spokesman. “The governor is focused on protecting the state’s best interest and the litigation cost pales in comparison to what is at stake.”
Meanwhile, legislative leaders filed two lawsuits with the Oklahoma Supreme Court saying Stitt exceeded his authority in authorizing additional compacts, which contained games not permitted under state law.
Lawmakers won one suit; the other is still pending.
The state was billed for appearances in court, legal research and analysis, correspondence, meetings, document reviews and other items, some of which were billed at $400 an hour. The law firms involved include: Ryan Whaley, $1.1 million; Lytle Soule & Felty, $282,609; Revelation Consulting, $433,208; and Perkins Coie, $9,975.
In addition, the state paid Dykema Gossett, a law firm based in Lansing, Michigan, $216,816, which came out of Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter’s budget. An additional invoice for $48,359 from Dykema Gossett is outstanding.
“We learned that in addition to wasting thousands of hours and the court’s valuable time, Stitt also spent more than $2 million of public funds waging his failed legal actions against sovereign tribal nations in his claim the model gaming compact had expired,” said Matthew L. Morgan, chairman of the Oklahoma Indian Gaming Association. “It should concern all Oklahomans that he used these funds from tribal governments that are designed for auditing, accounting and other oversight responsibilities under the gaming compact for other purposes.”
