A Native American man’s legal challenge to his murder conviction in Oklahoma could cause massive disruptions if it is upheld, because it could force the redrawing of legal boundaries in a sizable chunk of the state, a lawyer for the state told the Supreme Court on Nov. 27.
The murder case, known as Carpenter v. Murphy, has given rise to a boundary dispute that covers 4,600 square miles of land, including most of Tulsa, Oklahoma’s second-largest city. Shifting the internal border would have an impact on thousands of criminal cases and cause social, economic, and governmental upheaval, the state argues.
