A woman arrested after she refused to leave the area outside former president Donald Trump’s 2020 rally in Tulsa finally faces her trial — and her attorney says Mayor G.T. Bynum is set to testify.
Sheila Buck was arrested and later charged with misdemeanor obstruction after she refused to leave a fenced-off area outside the BOK Center in downtown Tulsa, where the rally was held. A security guard testified he told Buck she couldn’t wear her shirt that said “I Can’t Breathe” inside the rally, and that she refused to change or leave.
A judge will Buck’s attorney Dan Smolen to cross-examine Bynum during the trial. Smolen argues communication between Bynum and other city officials is pertinent to the trial.
An email from city legal confirmed Bynum will appear in the courtroom Tuesday afternoon.
In Buck’s defense, Smolen has argued the fenced-off area didn’t have a city event permit. Smolen, the members of the District Attorney’s office and Judge Kasey Baldwin all acknowledge the fenced-off area was federal property.
“Whether it was on a federally-protected area or not does not give a private entity the ability to remove a person because they don’t like the content of their speech,” Smolen said after a pretrial hearing last week.
But prosecutors argue state law requires citizens to comply with police officers, even if their orders end up being unconstitutional.
“Whether or not this arrest violated her First Amendment, the Defendant was required to resolve any difference of opinion on the matter in a courtroom, not in the street,” the District Attorney’s office trial brief reads.
Buck’s trial will commence at 9 a.m. Monday at the Tulsa County Courthouse.
