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OKLAHOMA CITY – A former Oklahoma City police officer is behind bars for the rest of his life after being convicted of sex crimes.
In December, Daniel Holtzclaw was convicted on 18 of 36 counts involving sex crimes.
He’s now serving a 263 year prison sentence.
When a jury came down with their verdict last year, Holtzclaw was shaking and broke down in tears.
Long before his breakdown in court, former Oklahoma City police officer Daniel Holtzclaw found himself in a small, dim interrogation room, facing two sex crimes detectives.
Detective: “I know you’re an officer and you’ve seen them a thousand times and read them yourself.”
Holtzclaw: “Right.”
Detective: “Still, ask me any questions. Don’t be embarrassed about that.”
Holtzclaw: “I think I’m already embarrassed.”
Detective: “Why are you embarrassed? Tell me why you’re embarrassed.
Holtzclaw: “The station deal.”
Detective: “Well, I mean there’s rumors flying and we tried to do that as quiet as we could, and that’s why we took you out the front and stuff. This is gonna make the rumors go away for you tomorrow. It’s gonna be on someone else. Let’s get them off of you and on to somebody else.”
At that point, officers read Holtzclaw his Miranda Rights and he chose to speak to detectives without an attorney.
Detectives: “You haven’t heard any rumors?”
Holtzclaw: “I haven’t heard any rumors, when I walked in the station, I saw the captain lean over, not unusual. The captain looked at me, but I’ve seen you and the cap, but I’d never seen you, but I haven’t heard anything.”
Detective: “We told you that there was a traffic stop and somebody made some allegations against an officer.”
Holtzclaw: “Right.”
Detective: “They don’t know the officer’s name, none of that. You said you made a traffic stop after work, but you didn’t call it in.”
Holtzclaw: “I didn’t call it in.”
Detective: “Where was that?”
Holtzclaw: “N.E. 50th and Lincoln, just to the west.”
Detective: “Tell me about that stop.”
Holtzclaw: “I was going westbound on N.E. 50th, probably a block just east of Lincoln. I see a red Grand AM in my outside lane, I’m in the inside lane. The car swerves, and so at the time I’m thinking it’s probably a drunk person or maybe he got excited because he saw a cop. So I kinda followed behind it, kinda drifting just a little bit. Not crossing the lines, nothing crazy. I light it up because of the traffic violation I saw at first when it swerved, now it’s just west of N.E. 50th and Lincoln. I made contact, it was a black female. I asked for license and insurance. She stated she didn’t have insurance, gave me an ID. At the time, I asked if she could give me valid insurance or a license. She told me, ‘No.’ I told her, ‘I just got off work, what’s the deal? Why are you swerving?’ She says she was trying to go home to Ann Arbor-ish on the northwest side to see her daughter or something like that. I asked if there was anything on board in the vehicle, ‘Is it alright if I search your vehicle?’ She said the only thing that’s inside there is a Koolaid cup. I’m like, ‘Is there anything inside that Koolaid, like liquor?’ She said, ‘No.’ I said, ‘Is there anything else inside there?’ She said, ‘There’s pills.’ I said, ‘Is that the only thing? Is it alright if I search your car?’ She said,’Yes.’ I go inside the car, there’s a lot of pills.”
Detective: “What kind of pills, like scattered pills?”
Holtzclaw: “It said hydrocodone pills, and I just quickly glanced at it and I think I saw her name on the prescription.”
Detective: “So it was in a bottle?”
Holtzclaw: “Right, there are several bottles in her purse. At the time, I returned back to her and like, I saw your pills but I didn’t see any alcohol. I sniffed it, drink didn’t smell like any alcohol in the Koolaid. I’m like, I just got off work, I’m tired, get your license taken care of.
Detective: “So she didn’t have a driver’s license.”
Holtzclaw: “She didn’t have a driver’s license and I’m just like, go to DPS, the Department of Public Safety on King, get that taken care of and I cut her loose after that.”
Detective: “Then where’d you go?”
Holtzclaw: “I went straight home.”
Detective: “Do you remember her name?”
Holtzclaw: “I don’t.”
The interrogation continued and questioning focused on that traffic stop.
Detective: “Do you make traffic stops after work often?”
Holtzclaw: “I don’t, but in that case, I saw her swerving… I felt like I needed to make that traffic stop.”
Detective: “How was she? Was she respectful?”
Holtzclaw: “She was nervous and whatnot, I was like,’Why are you nervous?’ She was even crying. I asked, ‘Why are you nervous, why are you crying?’ She said, ‘I don’t know, I’m just nervous ’cause you’re a cop and I got pulled over.’ I’m like, ‘There’s nothing you gotta be nervous about.’ I told her, ‘I’m like, I don’t really want to take you to jail for no SDL or anything, I just got off work, I’m tired.’ With my officer courtesy and whatnot and said to go get that taken care of tomorrow.”
Detective: “That’s fine, you don’t have to, I’m not gonna sit here and say, ‘Why didn’t you take her to jail?’ I could care less, no, I don’t care. Was she drunk? Did you think she was drunk?”
Holtzclaw: “I think she was, I think she was, she drank but with my experience, I don’t think she was past the legal limit. And that’s what I asked her too, with your pain medicines and hydrocodone, everyone knows that you drink with that and it maximizes the effect so, I asked her that, but she said, ‘No.’ But when she was in the back of my car and I was in the front, the driver’s seat I could smell it off of her but I don’t think she was still past the legal limit.”
Detective: “OK, so you got her out the car?”
Holtzclaw: “Yes.”
Detective: “Ok, and you put her in the back of your car.”
Holtzclaw: “Yes.”
Detective: “Any problems there?”
Holtzclaw: “No, she was cooperative with getting in, cooperative getting out.”
Detective: “Did you run her through Unit 800?”
Holtzclaw: “I didn’t.”
Detective: “You didn’t. Did you run her on MDT?”
Holtzclaw: “No, I didn’t. All my stuff, as far as that was, I didn’t call it in to say I was at a traffic stop, the computer was off and everything, as well.”
Detective: “Did you shut it off?”
Holtzclaw: “Yeah, I did. On 50th, I turned it off right before the traffic stop, basically.”
At that point, officers began asking about any physical contact Holtzclaw had with the victim.
Detective: “When you put her in your car, did you pat search her?”
Holtzclaw: “I came around and said, ‘Lift up your shirt, is there anything on you as far as your waistband or anything?’ Then I put her in the vehicle and went from there.”
Detective: “Did your hands go on her?”
Holtzclaw: “I backhanded it as far as the sides.”
Detective: “Where on her body?”
Holtzclaw: “Her waist and the back portion, I didn’t touch her butt or anything but the back portion of her waist and she lifted it up like right here.”
Detective: “Did she lift it up like this?” (making motion over the head)
Holtzclaw: “No.”
Detective: “So she never like went woo, nothing, exposed her breasts or anything?”
Holtzclaw: “She asked me and I was like, ‘No, that’s okay.”
Detective: “She asked you what?”
Holtzclaw: “If you want to search me, and I’m like, ‘No, that’s okay.”
Detective: “So she never put her hands on the car and you…” (makes pat down motions)
Holtzclaw: “No.”
At this point during the interrogation, officers tell Holtzclaw the allegations against him.
Detective: “She is making some sexual allegations, obviously, since sex crimes is working it.”
Holtzclaw: “What’d she say?”
Detective: “Was there anything, an accidental touch, anything?”
Holtzclaw: “If she thought, when I pat searched her, but it was nothing as far as I felt like I would do anything sexual or anything like that. For my safety, I just checked to see if weapons were there. To make clear, I didn’t touch her butt by the waistline or whatnot.”
Detective: “She’s saying you made her lift up her shirt, and when she lifted up her shirt, she exposed her breasts.”
Holtzclaw: “No, I said, ‘Is there anything inside your bra?’ And she said, ‘No.’ So I said, ‘Ok.’ She said, ‘Do you want me to show you?’ And I said, ‘No, no, you don’t need to do that.”
Detective: “She said she was doing this (pulls at shirt) when you said, ‘Is there anything inside your bra?’ She said that she, ‘No, I don’t have anything like that.’ Did she do that?”
Holtzclaw: “Yeah, she did but I didn’t look or do anything like that (leans over). She was like, ‘Do you want me to show you?’ And I said, ‘No.”
Detective: “She said when she said, ‘Do you want me to show you?’ You said, ‘Yes.’ And she…” (motions like lifting a shirt over her head)
Holtzclaw: “No”
Detective: “But could she have been flashing you and now you don’t want to tell me because you’re afraid you’ll get in trouble?”
Holtzclaw: “No, when I told her no, I said, ‘No.”
Detective: “She didn’t go (motions again) because sometimes drunk girls and partying, and let’s face it.”
Holtzclaw: “I’ve already heard stories about officers and whatnot.”
Detective: “And they want officers.”
Holtzclaw: “I said, ‘No.”
Detective: “And you could’ve said no, but I’m asking you if she flashed you anyway.”
Holtzclaw: “I didn’t see it.”
Detective: “You didn’t see boobies?”
Holtzclaw: “I didn’t see her breasts.”
Detective: “What about pants?”
Holtzclaw: “There was nothing in her pants as far as I searched, she was wearing tight jeans.”
Detective: “She said she pulled them down.”
Holtzclaw: “I didn’t see it.”
Detective: “You didn’t see her pull her pants down?”
Holtzclaw: “I didn’t see her pulling down pants.”
Detective: “Could she have done it while you were up searching the car?”
Holtzclaw: “She could’ve. I didn’t have her handcuffed or anything.”
Detective: “When you came back to the car and brought her out, were her pants fastened?”
Holtzclaw: “Yeah.”
Detective: “They were up?”
Holtzclaw: “Everything was still intact.”
Detective: “Why do you think she is making this up?”
Holtzclaw: “I don’t know.”
Detective: “Did you write her a ticket?”
Holtzclaw: “I didn’t. I let her go and said that I won’t even arrest you for a no SDL.”
Detective: “I’m trying to figure out why she would say that. I mean, I can see her saying it if you wrote her a ticket ’cause she’s pissed off. I’m gonna make it quite clear, if you saw her boobs, I don’t care, if she was flashing you.”
Holtzclaw: “I didn’t see her breasts.”
Detective: “You didn’t see her boobies?”
Holtzclaw: “No, I did not see her breasts.”
Detective: “She’s saying you shined your light on her. Where do you keep your flashlight?”
Holtzclaw: “This side right here, right by my radio.”
Detective: “Did you have the flashlight out on the traffic stop?”
Holtzclaw: “I didn’t.”
Detective: “When she was going like this (pulling shirt), did you have the flashlight on her?”
Holtzclaw: “I have it like this, but I didn’t.” (pretends to shine light on chest)
Detective: “Right, but did you have it on her when you’re talking to her so you can see?”
Holtzclaw: “So I can see her inside the vehicle.”
Detective: “Was the dome light on?”
Holtzclaw: “The dome light was not on.”
Detective: “Does that come on when you open the back door? It’s been too long since I’ve been in a scout car.”
Holtzclaw: “I don’t recall to be honest with you.”
Holtzclaw says he thought the traffic stop lasted 15 minutes and he was with her 10 minutes of that stop. He said it took so long because she was crying and upset.
Authorities ask for a DNA swab, which Holtzclaw willingly supplies to them.
Detective: “Well, Daniel this is kinda one of the things, we kinda bring you in here to see how truthful you are. You need to kinda think of a few different things here and we’ve pulled up a lot of different video from that area after these allegations. She also had a sane exam done which you know what that consists of. There’s a reason why we wanted your buccals. … you sure there’s nothing you want to?”
Holtzclaw: “Nothing.”
Detective: “So if we go off the video and watch that, you’re still gonna stick with your story?”
Holtzclaw: “Yes, sir.”
Detective: “If we go off DNA.”
Holtzclaw: “DNA as well.”
Detective: “Should we show you the video?”
Holtzclaw: “Yes… everything I recall of that night, that’s what happened.”
Detective: “Have I not asked enough questions?”
Holtzclaw: “I think everything’s been covered.”
Detective: “Do you remember putting your penis in her mouth?”
Holtzclaw: “I don’t.”
Detective: “Would you recall that if you did it?”
Holtzclaw: “If I did, yeah.”
Detective: “I think you gotta double think this. I gotta be honest with you, it doesn’t look really good for you. What you originally thought, detectives don’t just roll up in there for no reason. We didn’t just pick you out, there’s a whole line up there. But there’s definitely enough here to start questioning you. We knew you were on that stop, we knew you were there, and we can watch a whole lot of actions being performed while you were there. That’s why she was trying to give you every out on the whole boob thing.”
Detective: “Any reason why your penis would be out?”
Holtzclaw: “No.”
Detective: “Do you understand that you don’t have to full-blown ejaculate to get something out of the sane exam?”
Holtzclaw: “Right.”
Detective: “We can get skin cells, we can get pre-ejaculate, do all that and still get DNA.”
Holtzclaw: “Right.”
Detective: “And… did your penis go in her mouth?”
Holtzclaw: “No, it did not.”
Detective: “Here’s the deal too, we can fall on the sword and say I screwed up or something, but if we say we didn’t do it, we didn’t do it, we didn’t do it and then the DNA comes back and says he did it, then we have a huge problem. We’re here to give you the chance to fall on the sword so we don’t, we don’t want a huge problem, we don’t want a huge problem for you. This is time. It’s time. If it touched her mouth, if it touched the inside of her mouth for one second, two seconds, three seconds, you gotta tell us now.”
Detective: “If it was a get out of jail free card, that happens, we know that happens, but we gotta know that versus he made me and I didn’t want to.”
After Holtzclaw says that he is sticking to his story, detectives say there is another victim.
Detective: “Here again, for whatever reason, things are pointing at you again. This is even before this incident this morning.”
Detective: “Black female, downtown, City Rescue Mission.”
Holtzclaw: “I haven’t been to the City Rescue Mission.”
Detective: “I didn’t say you made it there.”
Detective: “Have you promised anyone a ride to the City Rescue Mission?”
Holtzclaw: “I haven’t had anyone ask for the City Rescue Mission.”
Detective: “She didn’t have to ask, did you offer to take anybody to the City Rescue Mission?”
Holtzclaw: “No, I don’t offer ’cause I don’t like going there.”
Holtzclaw said he didn’t recall a stop downtown
Detective: “The other girl he’s talking about is kinda making the same allegations, and that’s weird.”
Holtzclaw: “It doesn’t look good.”
As detectives continue to pour over the details of the traffic stop, Holtzclaw denies any wrongdoing.
Holtzclaw: “I’m a good officer, that’s not me.”
The detective asks Holtzclaw if he has any defining characteristics in his groin area. They also asked about his personal life, in which he admitted to having sex about every day. However, he said he never has been accused of sexual misconduct in the past.
After a short break, detectives began asking Holtzclaw to go over the events again and tried to determine if there was any way that something could be misconstrued as sexual advances during the traffic stop.
Detective: “Could you have got a hard on and she saw it and it scared her?”
Holtzclaw: “I don’t think I got a hard on, but like I said, she was already nervous and crying and whatnot. And I already told her, ‘Hey, I’m tired, I want to go home. There’s nothing to worry about.”
Detective: “Did your pants get unzips, unbuttoned, anything while you were standing right there?
Holtzclaw: “No.”
Detective: “CSI is processing your car right now and when we stepped out, they found some pubic hairs right in here. Could they be yours?”
Holtzclaw: “I didn’t pull my penis out, or do anything right there.”
Detective: “Did she?”
Holtzclaw: “No.
Detective: “Do you think it could be?”
Holtzclaw: “No, it’s not, no.”
Detective: “Your pubes couldn’t be right there?”
Holtzclaw: “No.”
Detective: “Has your penis ever been out?”
Holtzclaw: “While I’m working, no.”
Detective: “When you’re not working?”
Holtzclaw: “No.”
Officers confronted Holtzclaw about how nervous he acted when they asked about him seeing the victim’s breasts
They asked Holtzclaw if he liked older women and he said the oldest woman he ever slept with was 29. He also said that he wasn’t attracted to a specific race.
Holtzclaw: “This whole situation is just …. it is scary and I don’t want my rep to be …..everything is about your rep and I don’t want this to fall on my rep.”
Detective: “Why would she say make ’cause when a woman says something like this and they go through a sane exam and… you didn’t give her a ticket so she’s not getting out of a ticket, you didn’t arrest her ’cause we get those when they go to jail, ‘Oh, I’ve been raped,’ and have to work those stupid things ’cause they think they’re gonna get out of jail. Why in the world would she make this up?”
Holtzclaw: “I don’t know, I was, she was cooperative, she was nervous. Like I said earlier, crying, I told her not, I wasn’t worried about a state driver’s license.”
Detective: “She said she was crying.”
Holtzclaw: “Yeah, and I don’t, you know, at times as an officer, you might make a threat to be like, ‘Oh, I’m gonna take you to jail.’ To try to get someone to get in the car or something, you know, but that wasn’t the case. I wasn’t threatening her, I wasn’t.”
Detective: “Did she ever ask you if you were gonna shoot her?”
Holtzclaw: “She did. She was talking about a pistol all the time and talking about guns and whatnot. And I’m like, ‘Calm down. I’m not gonna shoot you or anything like that.”
Detective: “Did she think you were gonna shoot her?”
Holtzclaw: “Maybe. I even asked her, ‘What’s the deal with you and cops? You have a bad run-in with a cop?’ That was it.”
Detective: “So you did tell her to calm down. Did you ever tell her, ‘I promise I’ll let you go?”
Holtzclaw: “I did. I said, ‘I promise I’m gonna let you go. I’m not worried about a state driver’s license. Is there anything inside that car?”
Detective: “Did you tell her you were gonna follow her home?”
Holtzclaw: “I did, but then when she took forever to turn around, I got annoyed and said, ‘Screw it.’ But I saw her in the rearview mirror take 44 when I went northbound on Broadway.”
Detective: “Where did she live?”
Holtzclaw: “She said she was going to her sister’s house in Ann Arbor.”
Detective: “Were you really gonna follow her? That’s far.”
Holtzclaw said he was gonna drift off after following her for a little bit, adding that she wasn’t drunk.
Detective: “Is there any way your skin cells are going to be by her mouth?”
Holtzclaw: “No.”
Detective: “Skin cells from your fingers? Did you touch her body anywhere other than with the back of your hand pat-searching her?”
Holtzclaw: “I just pat-searched her and that was about it. Didn’t touch her face or anything.”
Holtzclaw continued to deny that he had any sexual contact with the victim, saying that there was no hookup.
Detective: “When we first walked into that office, the first time you saw us, and we just kinda started talking, you brought up this traffic stop.”
Holtzclaw: “Because the major came in and heard the captain talking about 50th and Lincoln.”
The officers asked about the pat-search again, focusing on when the victim shook out her bra. Holtzclaw maintained that she was facing away from him when she did that. However, the detective asked why you would have someone shake out their bra if you can’t see anything falling.
Holtzclaw said it was for his own safety, saying if she had a weapon, she wouldn’t be able to see him.
Detective: “The thing that kinda concerns me is everything you’re telling me is dead-on to what she says. Everything, except the sexual stuff.”
Holtzclaw: “Nothing was done, as far as that, nothing.”
After a short break, the detectives start talking about the other victim near downtown Oklahoma City.
Detective: “It’s the exact same thing, too. Stop her, have her sit in the back seat, run her for warrants, then have her get out, unzip the pants. I mean, on and on and on, it’s to a tee, the exact same thing.”
However, Holtzclaw said he didn’t even remember stopping the second victim in May.
Holtzclaw: “She described you to a tee, like I said, it’s everything.”
Holtzclaw says he runs into a lot of people around that area, since that is where he usually patrols.
Detectives asked Holtzclaw how long his traffic stops usually take, to which he replied 20 minutes.
Detective: “That’s a long time.”
Detective: “The question I have is that we have a lapse in time here, so to get a better handle on where the time went. You’re talking about 15 minutes, no 800, no running on the computer, you shut it down, and even you said it was a quick little search of the car. Where’s the rest of the time?”
Holtzclaw: “Just talking to her.”
When asked about what, Holtzclaw said he was trying to determine if she was drunk. He admitted to not doing any sobriety tests, which led the detectives to ask more questions about the time of the traffic stop.
Detective: “Right there, those questions took maybe 40 seconds, 15 minutes?”
Since Holtzclaw admitted to the victim crying during the traffic stop, they asked how much she could really talk if she was so upset.
Detective: “Did she ever say, ‘You shouldn’t do this?”
Holtzclaw: “No.”
Detective: “Or I can’t do this?”
Holtzclaw: “No.”
After a break, detectives begin questioning Holtzclaw about his claims that he tried to go home and have sex with his girlfriend.
Detective: “I just talked to Carrie, she said that she was asleep when you got home and you did not try to have sex and you did not have sex.”
Holtzclaw says that his girlfriend goes to be early, but the officers said that she would remember.
Detective: “She would know if you tried. I’m a woman and my husband comes home in the middle of the night, and I’m like, ‘Are you kidding me, I’m asleep.’ You said you trolled around her vagina, you put it in a little bit and then she said, ‘I’m tired, no.”
Holtzclaw: “I did.”
Detective: “She would remember that to tell me. She said you did not try to have sex.”
Holtzclaw said that he believed his girlfriend was caught off guard since she didn’t know why other officers were calling her and asking personal questions.
At the end of the video, the detectives called Holtzclaw’s girlfriend back and took his uniform into their possession to have it tested.
The jury saw the above video clips, but there were two segments that were taken out by a judge’s order.
First, detectives asked Holtzclaw if he was on steroids, which he denied. He tested negative for steroids, so attorneys did not want to taint the jury’s image of him by suggesting he may be taking them.
Also, a judge ruled that a portion dealing with a polygraph tests should be removed since polygraph tests are not admissible in court.
In the video, the detectives ask Holtzclaw if he would be willing to take a polygraph test since DNA evidence can take a while to be processed.
He agrees.