The conviction of an Oklahoma man convicted of first-degree homicide and sentenced for life in prison was overturned, and he has been awarded a fresh trial. This is because the judge who presided over the trial and one of the prosecutors in his case had previously engaged in a “undisclosed”, sexual relationship.
TheBlaze published a report in December 2021 stating that Robert Leon Hashagen III who had earlier been convicted for the murder of his 94-year old neighbor Evelyn Goodall in 2013 might have his conviction vacated. His lawyers had learned from Tim Henderson, a former Oklahoma County judge, who presided over Hashagen’s murder trial, that Henderson had been involved with one of three prosecutors in Hashagen’s criminal case. Henderson and K.C. – the assistant district prosecutor who was assigned to Hashagen’s case – had a “previously undeclared sexual relationship” from 2016 until 2018, according to court documents.
James Lockard, Hashagen’s attorney, wrote that “the integrity of the Oklahoma judiciary is at stake in this case.” “If a person can be sentenced to death in prison after a trial by a judge and a prosecutor who literally were in bed together, no Oklahoman can or should.”
