By Yaya Diamond

Hey Diamonds. I need you to sit with me for a minute, because what I'm about to tell you is not a rumor, not a headline somebody made up, and not something from a hundred years ago. This happened in 2023, in America, and it was captured on audio — in their own voices, out of their own mouths.

The video going around shows the fallout of a secret recording made after a March 6, 2023 county commissioners meeting in McCurtain County, Oklahoma. The publisher of the McCurtain Gazette-News, Bruce Willingham, left a voice-activated recorder in the room because he suspected county officials were doing county business in secret after the meeting ended. What that recorder picked up should shake every single one of us.

Let me name the people in that room, because hiding behind "unnamed officials" is exactly how this kind of evil survives:

Sheriff Kevin Clardy — the top law enforcement officer in McCurtain County.

Sheriff Kevin Clardy, McCurtain County

County Commissioner Mark Jennings — an elected official, District 2.

Captain Alicia Manning — an investigator with the sheriff's department.

Jail Administrator Larry Hendrix — the man in charge of the county jail.

Mark Jennings (left) and Sheriff Kevin Clardy (right), McCurtain County

On that tape, these four people — people sworn to protect and serve — sat around and did two things. First, they discussed killing two journalists: Bruce Willingham and his son, Gazette-News reporter Chris Willingham. Jennings said, "I know where two deep holes are dug if you ever need them." Sheriff Clardy answered, "I've got an excavator." Jennings went on to say he knew "two or three hit men" in Louisiana — "they're very quiet guys."

Let that sink in. A sheriff and a county commissioner discussing where to bury murdered journalists.

Second — and this is the part that made my blood boil — they sat around wishing they could lynch Black people. Jennings said, "If it was back in the day... I'd run for sheriff," and then: "Take them down to Mud Creek and hang them up with a damn rope. But you can't do that anymore. They got more rights than we got."

"They got more rights than we got." Read that again. That is the mindset of a man who held elected power over Black citizens in his county. And Manning, the investigator, chimed right in about reporter Chris Willingham: "I'm worried about what I might do to him. My papaw would have whipped his ass."

Now here's the part that should make you furious. Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt called for all four of them to resign. Mark Jennings did resign. But Attorney General Gentner Drummond investigated and announced he found no grounds under Oklahoma law to remove the elected officials — and encouraged voters to just "not reelect" them. The sheriff's office, instead of showing remorse, claimed the recording was altered and accused the newspaper of breaking the law for recording them.

So a sheriff caught on tape joking about burying journalists and lynching Black people kept his badge. A journalist and his son had to fear for their lives — Chris Willingham reportedly moved his family to Tulsa out of concern for their safety. And the system said: nothing we can do.

Jennings and Clardy in front of the McCurtain County building

This is why people keep saying racism is alive and well. Not because we're "playing the race card." Because we keep catching it on tape, in boardrooms, in sheriff's offices, in the mouths of the very people sworn to protect us — and then watching nothing happen.

I am naming them because they need to be named: Kevin Clardy. Mark Jennings. Alicia Manning. Larry Hendrix. Say their names. Remember what they said. And remember that "back in the day" thinking is not back in the day — it is sitting in office right now, wearing a badge, holding a gavel, running a jail.

We cannot afford to look away. Not now. Not ever.

— Yaya Diamond

Photos: news coverage of McCurtain County officials (The Lost Ogle, News 9).