Former TCSO Deputy Shannon Clark Granted Retired Peace Officer Status

Tulsa County commissioners approved a request Monday to allow former deputy Shannon Clark to retain his peace officer status.

The commissioners also approved a $150,000 payment to Clark to settle a lawsuit he planned to file for wrongful termination. 

Clark worked at the sheriff's office for 15 years. He oversaw jail operations and was the public information officer when he was fired in May of 2015.

Clark filed paperwork earlier this year notifying the county of his intent to sue. Tulsa County Sheriff Vic Regalado announced last week his office reached a settlement with Clark, but Regalado's office refused to release details of the settlement. The details were listed in the agenda for Monday's meeting of the county commission.

A few months after his termination Clark told News On 6 he believed Tulsa County Sheriff Stanley Glanz fired him because Glanz believed he had leaked a 2009 report showing complaints about the training of reserve deputy Bob Bates.

Bates was the reserve deputy who accidentally shot and killed Eric Harris during a gun sting operation in April of 2015. In May of 2016, a judge sentenced Bates to four years in prison after a jury convicted him of manslaughter in the case.

The Bates case eventually led to Glanz's resignation, after a grand jury indicted him for misusing a county vehicle and for not releasing the 2009 report. In July, he pleaded guilty to the vehicle charge and no contest to the charge about the report and a judge gave him a one-year suspended sentence and ordered him to pay $7,500 in restitution. Glanz still faces lawsuits filed against him when he was sheriff.