Tahlequah Residents Sentenced for Role in Cherokee County Robbery
MUSKOGEE, OKLAHOMA – The United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Oklahoma announced that Kody Fields, age 24, Fvs-Chvtv Amos Lawhead, age 30, and Jimmy Dale Brown, age 31, all Tahlequah residents, were sentenced for their roles in a 2021 Cherokee County robbery. Lawhead and Fields were both sentenced to 120 months in prison. Brown was sentenced to 46 months in prison.
The charges arose from investigations by the Cherokee County Sheriff’s Office and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
On July 24, 2021, Fields, Lawhead, and Brown robbed a victim at gunpoint, firing multiple rounds, and demanding the victim’s cash, phone, firearm, and vehicle.
On February 9, 2022, Brown pleaded guilty to one count of Robbery, and Lawhead pleaded guilty to one count of Use, Carry, Brandish and Discharge of a Firearm During and in Relation to a Crime of Violence.
On February 22, 2022, Fields pleaded guilty to one count of Use, Carry, Brandish and Discharge of a Firearm During and in Relation to a Crime of Violence.
“Using firearms to commit crimes will not be tolerated in the Eastern District of Oklahoma,” said United States Attorney Christopher J. Wilson. “Under federal law, using, carrying, brandishing, and/or discharging a firearm during the commission of a violent crime subjects offenders to mandatory minimum prison sentences, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office will not hesitate to pursue these charges when the facts warrant.”
The United States Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Oklahoma prosecuted these cases because the defendants are members of a federally recognized Indian tribe and the crimes occurred in Cherokee County, within the boundaries of the Cherokee Nation Reservation and the Eastern District of Oklahoma.
The Honorable Ronald A. White, Chief Judge in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma, presided over the hearings in Muskogee. Fields, Lawhead, and Brown will remain in custody of the U.S. Marshal pending transportation to a designated United States Bureau of Prisons facility to serve non-paroleable sentences of incarceration.
Assistant United States Attorney Ryan Bondura represented the United States at sentencing.
