Source: United States Department of Justice News
A 28-year-old Tulsa man was sentenced in federal court for breaking into a former girlfriend’s home and strangling her in a 2021 Mother’s Day attack, announced U.S. Attorney Clint Johnson.
U.S. District Judge Stephen J. Murphy III sentenced Anthony Lamont Mason II to 84 months in federal prison followed by three years of supervised release.
In May 2022, a jury convicted Mason of one count of assault of a former intimate and dating partner by strangling, suffocating, and attempting to strangle and suffocate in Indian Country and one count of first degree burglary in Indian Country.
“The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Oklahoma is committed to prosecuting domestic violence cases and protecting victims,” said U.S. Attorney Clint Johnson. “Anthony Mason II will spend seven years in prison for a violent attack on his ex-girlfriend while children were in the home. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Chantelle Dial and George Jiang are to be commended for their astute performance at trial and their advocacy for the victim in this case. ”
According to court documents, Mason initially confronted the victim in violation of a protection order the morning of May 9, 2021, while she was out with her child in Broken Arrow. He was upset and asked why she wouldn’t speak to him, who she was allowing into her home, and then questioned her about her phone.
Later that day, Mason broke into the victim’s home and assaulted her. Before Mason broke her door, the victim had been home spending Mother’s Day with several friends, her child, and her child’s friend. After her last adult friend left the residence, the victim received a call from a private number and out of concern, shut the front blinds. She then looked out the window and saw Mason approach the home. The victim tried to call 911, threw her phone under the bed, hid the children in a closet, then returned to the front of the home where Mason had forced his way through the front door, breaking her locks. The victim’s doorbell camera captured 25 seconds of the incident, first showing what looked like a hand covering the camera then the sound of the victim’s screams and terrified pleas for him to stop.
Inside, Mason grabbed the victim by the neck, demanding to know where her phone was located. He dragged her by her hair, strangled her until she nearly blacked out, poured water over her mouth and nose, continuing to obstruct her breathing, and then hit her on the head with a hard, heavy object the victim believed to be a gun. He told the victim if she told anyone, he would kill her, and then moved toward where she had hidden the children. To protect the children, the victim tried to distract the defendant by fleeing from her home, screaming, knowing he would follow and try to stop her. Surveillance video from a nearby home captured Mason chasing the victim from her home and down the street, throwing her to the concrete, then continuing to run from the scene.
During trial, federal prosecutors introduced numerous other domestic violence acts committed by Mason against the victim prior to the May 9, 2021, attack which showed an escalating pattern of violence. The victim reported that Mason had strangled her multiple times since March 2020, broke her driver’s side car window in anger, and broke a window to get into her home when she was not present on Feb. 27, 2021. Video surveillance from Feb. 27, played for the jury at trial, showed Mason in the victim’s home, rifling through her bedroom and flipping over her mattress. Mason also repeatedly violated a March 2021 protective order.
Mason also had prior domestic violence charges brought against him involving other intimate partners, including a conviction in Tulsa County District Court.
The FBI and Tulsa Police Department conducted the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Chantelle D. Dial and George Jiang prosecuted the case.