(Stillwater, Okla.) – A homeless man who admitted possessing a pickup stolen in Drumright from Koby Oilfield Service and having methamphetamine in his jeans when he was arrested at a Cushing bar was ordered into the Payne County Drug Court program as part of a plea bargain approved in court Friday.
Former Perkins resident James Leroy Fowler, 33, was ordered to pay $4,980 restitution, as well as $800 in fines and assessments, and to perform 40 hours of community service along with successfully completing Drug Court, by Payne County District Judge Phillip Corley, who put him on probation for seven years Friday.
Fowler was arrested at 12:30 a.m. on Dec. 17, 2014, at the Cin City Bar in Cushing, less than two hours after police were notified to look for a stolen white 2013 Ford F-250 with “Koby,” on the side, Cushing Police Sgt. Carson Watts wrote in an affidavit.
Fifteen minutes after being advised about the stolen truck, Cushing Police Office Jonathan Hall found it at the City City Bar, but “Koby” had been covered with black spray paint, the affidavit said.
At 12:10 a.m. Officers Hall and Watts positioned their patrol cars in front and back of the truck to block it from being driven away, the affidavit said.
“I then noticed that the passenger’s side of the windshield had a hole and excessive damage,” Watts wrote in his affidavit.
After Fowler was placed in investigative detention in the bar, “James immediately told me that he did not know what I was talking about because he had been dropped off at the bar,” Watts wrote in his affidavit.
“As we were walking outside, Officer Hall asked the people James was with if he had any property that belonged to him,” and a woman “picked up a keychain with a Ford key from the table and said, “Here are his keys,” which the officer took possession of, Watts wrote in his affidavit.
Outside, “James kept telling me that he had been dropped off at the bar,” Watts wrote in his affidavit.
“I then pressed the unlock button on the key that was given to me, and it unlocked the vehicle in question,” Watts wrote in the affidavit.
“James then changed his story and told me that David Willis, the reporting party, had allowed him to borrow the vehicle. James said that David had given him $20 and let him borrow a pair of boots and a shirt as well,” the affidavit said.
“I asked James how the damage to the windshield occurred, and he told me that while driving down 9th Street to Cushing from Drumright, he hit a sign. I asked James if he had spray-painted the side of the vehicle.
“James said that it was not spray-painted when he had the vehicle and believed that someone else had painted it while at the bar because a lot of people don’t like the Koby business,” Watts wrote in his affidavit.
The woman, who had given police the keys to the truck, said she arrived at the Cushing bar at 8:45 p.m., about the same time as Fowler, the affidavit said.
She said at about 9:30 p.m., “James gave her the key to the truck for her to drive, telling her it was his and then left to go to the Broken J Bar north of Cushing on Highway 18,” where they stayed for about 30 minutes before returning back to the Cin City Bar, the affidavit said.
After Fowler was arrested for possessing a stolen truck, “while I was retrieving property from James’ pockets, I found a small blue plastic baggy containing a clear crystal substance,” which field-tested as methamphetamine, Watts wrote in his affidavit.
“I asked James about the baggy and he claimed to know nothing about it because the pants belonged to his ‘old lady.’
“I asked James, ‘You’re wearing women’s jeans?’ and he said yes,” Watts wrote in his affidavit.
Two weeks before his arrest at the Cushing bar, Fowler had appeared in court on charges of threatening harm to a man by phone and shoving a woman on the porch of her Cushing residence on Oct. 23, 2014 while he was intoxicated, court records show.
In court Friday, Fowler also pleaded guilty to those misdemeanor charges for which he was placed on one year’s probation, fined $50 and given a 30-day jail term, which he had already served.
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