As Delaware County Sheriff's Deputies arrived at his home to serve a search warrant last weekend, Wallace Geary Fields put a gun under his chin and fired.
The 68-year-old Fields, of Grove, Oklahoma, had been charged the day before with multiple sex offenses, including two counts of lewd or indecent proposals to a child under 16, three counts of lewd or indecent acts to a child under 16, and first-degree rape by instrumentation of a child under 14.
Read more about Lewd or Indecent Proposals or Acts to a Child Under 16.
According to Delaware County Sheriff Harlan Moore, deputies were attempting to serve the high-risk felony warrant just before midnight Saturday when Geary "came out of the door and said, 'What do you want?" Moore continued, "Before we could answer, he shot himself.”
After shooting himself with a .22 pistol, Fields was transported to a nearby hospital for treatment. He is listed in stable condition.
Fields's desperation is understandable. When faced with sex crime charges, it can seem as if your life is over. People begin to suspect you and your civil liberties are stripped from you even before you have your day in court. A mere accusation is enough to trigger suspicion, and your relationships are strained without any evidence of wrongdoing. For some, the stigma and consequences of a sex crime accusation seem too much to bear.
In 2007, a then-popular NBC Dateline program, "To Catch a Predator," initiated a sting in Texas that led to the suicide of an assistant district attorney. Louis Conradt, Jr., 56, allegedly chatted online with a decoy he believed to be a 13-year-old boy. While dozens of other men caught by Dateline went to the home designated as the meeting place between the adults and the decoy, Conradt did not show up. Instead, police served a warrant at his home the following day, with Dateline cameras rolling. Conradt did not answer the door, and when police entered the home, he shot himself, dying of his injuries the following day.
Conradt's sister filed a $105 million lawsuit against NBC which was "amicably resolved" in 2008. Because the "To Catch a Predator" had become so "highly charged," NBC discontinued the program in December 2007.
Despite overwhelming feelings of despair when facing a sex crime arrest, self-harm is not the answer. Even in the most challenging and difficult situations, help is available and defense strategies can be carefully utilized to minimize the fallout of an arrest and criminal charge.
Click here to learn more about Oklahoma sex crime defense or to submit a free case review form.
