County settles with ex-inmate

TULSA, Okla. (AP) -- A federal court settlement has been reached with a former Tulsa County inmate in which he will receive $20,000 for injuries received during a jailhouse brawl.

Chad Cullen Oberhammer, 21, will get the same amount as two other former inmates who were involved in the fracas at the old Tulsa Jail. Elliott Jason Duncan Jr. and RaEarl Hall Smith each settled their civil cases for $20,000 in May.

"We didn't want any more than the other guys did, but we weren't going to settle for anything less, either," said Oberhammer's attorney, Edward G. Lindsey.

Oberhammer sued Tulsa County and Sheriff Stanley Glanz on Dec.

21, claiming that he was savagely beaten by deputies and inmates at the jail in August 1998.

Oberhammer, who is white but denies being a white supremacist, claimed that on Aug. 11, 1998, he found himself in a cell with black inmates and that a "racial conflict arose."

He alleged that staff placed the inmates together in the so-called Aryan Tank "in a deliberate attempt to incite violence among the (jail) population."

The suit claimed that Oberhammer then was forcibly removed from the cell by deputies who allegedly handcuffed him, placed him on the floor and hit, kicked and stomped on him.

Oberhammer, of Broken Arrow, claimed that he continues to suffer pain and severe emotional distress, significant memory loss and hearing loss and has a permanent wrist injury.

The fight led to the suspensions of nine Sheriff's Office employees. The Sheriff's Office fired four employees on Aug. 21, 1998, in what was regarded as a related move.

Lindsey said Oberhammer is currently housed at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester. Oberhammer was sentenced Nov. 18, 1998, in Tulsa County District Court to six years in state custody after pleading guilty to a robbery charge, court records show.