True Crime Chronicles: Muskogee County Murder conviction sent 1982 killer away for life without parole

In the early hours of December 4, 1982, a series of phone calls came into the Smith Ambulance dispatch in Muskogee County, Oklahoma.

The caller, a man, first asked for an ambulance near a curve by a high cliff one or two miles from Taft. Later calls followed: one at 4:15 a.m. asking if anything had been found, and another at 4:39 a.m. directing responders to send help one and a half miles west of Taft, stating a woman had been shot and needed immediate aid.

Muskogee County Deputy Sheriff James Carney arrived at the location and found the body of Sheryl D. Bennett, a 20-year-old woman from Tulsa. She had been shot five times. Bennett was the girlfriend of Johnny Lee Hardeman, then 21 years old. Prosecutors argued that Hardeman killed her to prevent her from testifying against him in another murder case.

Seven weeks earlier, on July 2, 1982, Sam Miller Morgan, a 79-year-old Muskogee resident, had been shot and killed outside his home on Court Street in what appeared to be a robbery attempt. Morgan had struggled with two assailants before being fatally shot.

Bennett had told authorities, including Muskogee police detective Allen Simmons Jr., that Hardeman admitted to her he robbed and shot Morgan after a fight broke out. Her willingness to testify became public after a newspaper article in the Muskogee Phoenix.

Witnesses also described prior incidents of aggression: John Morris testified about Hardeman's behavior toward Bennett at a basketball game, and Joseph Bennett, her brother, said he saw Hardeman attack her in their front yard about a week before her death. Detective Simmons noted that Bennett had expressed fear for her life after agreeing to testify

.Hardeman was sought in connection with Morgan's death, and a "John Doe" warrant was issued. A reward was offered through the Muskogee Crimestoppers program. On January 13, 1983, acting on a tip, police located Hardeman at a house in west Muskogee. He surrendered peacefully around 1:30 p.m., initially facing a charge of concealing stolen property, with the first-degree murder charge for Bennett's killing filed soon after.

Hardeman was tried in Muskogee County District Court under Case No. CRF-82-457 before District Judge Lyle Burris. In June 1983, a jury found him guilty of first-degree murder. Prosecutors had sought the death penalty, citing the premeditated nature of the killing to eliminate a witness.

The jury recommended life imprisonment, and Hardeman was sentenced accordingly on July 7, 1983

.He appealed to the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals. In a 1987 decision (Hardeman v. State, 743 P.2d 148), the court affirmed the conviction and sentence. Later, Hardeman pursued federal habeas corpus relief, raising issues about the absence of a pre-trial mental competency hearing.

Those claims were denied, with courts ruling he had waived certain arguments by not raising them on direct appeal.

The charge against Hardeman in Morgan's murder was dismissed due to lack of evidence after Bennett's death removed the primary witness. Physical evidence from the crime scene did not link him directly to that shooting.

.Hardeman, born around 1961-1962, has served his life sentence in Oklahoma Department of Corrections facilities.

He has appeared on parole dockets several times, including in 2008 (at age 47), 2014 (at age 53), and 2017 (at age 56), with reviews of his prison conduct.

As of the most recent available public records from that period, parole was considered but not granted. and he remains icarceratedat the Oklahoma State Prison in McAlester.