No one disputes that Tyesha Long shot and killed her ex-boyfriend nearly five years ago.
But after spending almost three years in prison for manslaughter, she could soon walk free under a new Oklahoma law meant to give domestic violence survivors a second chance.
Long, 26, this month asked Oklahoma County District Judge Susan Stallings to revisit her sentence under the Oklahoma Survivors Act and consider that she was abused by her ex-boyfriend. Her attorneys at the Oklahoma Appleseed Center for Law and Justice hope the law will persuade the judge to reduce Long’s sentence to time served and send her back home to her family.
Since the morning of Nov. 4, 2020, Long has been in the custody of Oklahoma County law enforcement. That day, she fatally shot 55-year-old Ray Brown inside a hotel elevator lobby in the Bricktown neighborhood of Oklahoma City.
At the time, Long was a 21-year-old auto body mechanic and cowgirl who stood firm that she acted in self-defense. Her detailed accounts of abuse and documented history of domestic violence did not matter to prosecutors, who charged her with first-degree intentional murder, her advocates said. Instead, she was held without bond before trial and later as a jury decided her future.
Long was convicted in 2022 of first-degree manslaughter in the death of her alleged abuser. Prosecutors then said that they believed Long acted in cold blood. But she was spared from a possible death sentence or life in prison after jurors rejected that theory.
A judge accepted the jury’s 27-year prison recommendation.
“She did everything absolutely the way you’re supposed to, and she’s still sitting behind bars with a 27-year sentence. … Her sentence is more than she has been alive,” said Taylor Bell, a 26-year-old high school friend of Long. Bell helps manage an Instagram account advocating for Long’s release.
At Long’s 2022 trial, jurors did not hear evidence about her ex-boyfriend’s documented pattern of abuse against other women. Advocates say this is a key factor that highlights the urgency of laws like the Oklahoma Survivors Act to be enacted in more states to give a full picture of the domestic violence that someone who is accused of a crime experienced. It’s still at the judge’s discretion at a post-conviction hearing which documented evidence of abuse can be presented.
Advocates argue such legislation is essential, especially as the number of incarcerated women, particularly Black women, continues to rise as they are convicted of acts of violence in connection with their abuse. Supporters also say that the increase of incarcerated Black women is tied to federal conspiracy laws associated with drug-related “girlfriend crimes,” which often result in extreme sentences.
The Oklahoma law gives domestic violence survivors a chance to present the history of the alleged abuse either before sentencing or, as in Long’s case, during a post-conviction hearing for a possible reduction in their sentence.
There are other states that have laws similar to the Oklahoma Survivors Act. Legislation passed in states like New York, Illinois, and Georgia. Connecticut and Massachusetts introduced bills this year. Prosecutors have also driven second-chance legislation. California became the first to adopt Prosecutor-Initiated Resentencing in 2018, and since then states like Washington, Oregon, Illinois, and Minnesota have followed. These laws let prosecutors request reduced sentences in cases prosecutors once tried, usually after years have passed. Timelines vary by state.
A written decision in Long’s case is forthcoming. It could be published by the end of September, Long’s attorney, Colleen McCarty, told Capital B in an Aug. 14 interview.
If the judge grants Long’s petition, the law requires her sentence be reduced to no more than 15 years. Long has already served four years, and the minimum sentence for her conviction is four years.
An online petition launched in January is calling for her release.
A protection order before the fatal shooting
Tyesha Long was a 21-year-old auto body mechanic and cowgirl in 2020 when she shot and killed her ex-boyfriend. (Courtesy of Taylor Bell)
Ray Brown entered Long’s life in 2019 as a regular customer of her family’s auto body and dry cleaning business. At the time, Long was 17 and Brown, who was 53, was well-known in the community as the owner of an event center, her friend Bell said. That same year, another friend gave Long a gun for self-protection after several break-in attempts at her family’s shop.
McCarty, executive director of the Oklahoma Appleseed Center for Law and Justice, said almost every week, Long would grab her leather cowboy boots and hat to compete in rodeos and barrel racing. Behind the smiles she wore at the events, McCarty said Long hid the abuse she later described to 911 and investigators.
A year prior to the fatal shooting, an Oklahoma County judge granted Long a victim’s protective order against Brown, which is a document legally requiring him to stay away following her allegations. According to court documents, she said that Brown was her ex-boyfriend and that he threatened, harassed, and stalked her and her grandparents, News 9 reported.
Long began carrying her gun in her waistband wherever it was legally allowed, according to her petition to reduce her sentence. Bell said Long got her license to carry a firearm even though state laws do not require one.
A “poster child” for the Oklahoma Survivors Act
At the August hearing, prosecutors with the Oklahoma County District Attorney’s Office continued to stand by the 2022 conviction. They argued before Judge Shillings that Long did not act in self-defense when she shot Brown in the back shoulder, killing him.
Prosecutors cross-examined Long for hours and asked her questions about her tumultuous relationship with Brown. Her uncle was in court throughout her August hearing, McCarty, said.
Her attorney showed the judge photographs of bruises on Long’s neck as well as screenshots of text messages between Brown and Long, who was pregnant at the time, and how she had a miscarriage after she was thrown down a flight of stairs by Brown. This evidence hadn’t been presented to jurors during her first trial.
McCarty said Long is the “poster child” for the state’s Survivor’s Act because of her documented history of abuse.
But one advocate said it’s “hard to imagine more Black women benefiting” from similar second chance laws.
Sydney McKinney, executive director of the National Black Women’s Justice Institute, said the criminal justice system has “no understanding of gender or trauma.” She also said Black communities often distrust the police, which means Black women are less likely to have official documentation — like police reports or orders of protection — that’s typically required as evidence to prove your defense.
“It’s because of a lack of understanding of, really, the factors that bring women in contact with our criminal legal system,” said McKinney, who is hopeful for others since the law seems to work in Long’s favor to get a hearing.
Additionally, McKinney said, “There is psychological abuse that’s not the kind of violence and harm that’s going to have documentation.” But she said it is “the kind of violence and harm that a woman may experience that is made to feel unsafe, and like she is under imminent threat, and her life is in danger.”
And there’s evidence that women who call police during a domestic violence incident often have negative experiences that leave them feeling unsafe — and make them less likely to seek help from law enforcement in the future, McKinney said.
But at the August hearing, McCarty was able to bring in a domestic violence expert to discuss what a traumatic event can have on someone’s memories. “Both when it’s happening and after the fact, and whether they can resurface, or whether they do or they don’t, or how it changes,” McCarty said.
What happened to Tyesha Long?
Loved ones said Long is known for her vivacious smile and keen sense of humor. And while she is now in prison, she hasn’t wavered in her claim that she acted in self-defense in 2020.
“Even with everything that she’s going through right now, she’s still always cracking jokes, always laughing, and, yeah, she just has a really bright spirit,” Bell said about her and Long’s most recent conversation.
Bell said Long confided in her about feeling lonely, and she told her that she had been placed in isolation due to the publicity surrounding her case. She said the Instagram page calling for Long’s release has been “blowing up, more than usual,” Bell added.
On the night of the fatal shooting on Nov. 4, 2020, Long and Brown were at a Hilton Garden Inn in the eighth-floor elevator lobby. They argued over the key to his room, according to Long. She told investigators she shot him in self-defense after he tried to choke and threatened to kill her.
Long testified at her 2022 trial that she took Brown’s threat seriously because throughout the relationship he had “done everything he had said he was going to do,” the Oklahoman reported.
“You could hear it on the 911 call, that she’s very distraught about what happened. She didn’t want that to happen,” McCarty said. “And she says on the 911 call, ‘I have a protective order against him.’ She’s talking about their history.”
After the shooting, police found her in a room inside the hotel.
But prosecutors charged Long with first-degree murder. Authorities said that Brown’s body wasn’t in the elevator lobby. He was found by investigators face down, near his room, and he was holding a keycard in his hand, police testified at Long’s 2022 trial.
Investigators said Brown had been shot in the back shoulder by someone standing at least 3 feet away, the Oklahoman reported.
“The two versions don’t necessarily match up, and that was something that the state harped on repeatedly,” McCarty said.
McCarty added: “She believed at trial, and she still believes now, that she remembers shooting him in the chest. She knows that’s not what the evidence showed.”
The post She Got 27 Years for Killing Her Abuser. Oklahoma’s Survivors Act Could Free Her. appeared first on Capital B News.
