OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) – Prosecutors charged an Oklahoma state senator with felony sexual battery after an Uber driver accused him of grabbing her head and kissing her neck while she was driving him to a bar in June.
In court documents filed Wednesday , an Oklahoma City police detective says the driver told investigators that Republican state Sen. Bryce Marlatt stumbled into her car and commented on her appearance when she picked him up from a restaurant June 26. She said during the ride, he grabbed her and kissed her neck and shoulder.
“He made a comment that if she worked for him then he would ‘feel’ her up,” Detective Natalie Cannon wrote in an affidavit accompanying the charge. “(Marlatt) made comments to the victim asking her to go back to his hotel with him and to have a drink with him, which she declined.”
Marlatt, a 40-year-old married father of four from the western Oklahoma city of Woodward, previously said he was shocked by the allegations. Neither he nor his lawyer, Scott Anderson, replied to phone messages and emails seeking comment about the charge, which carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.
Marlatt was relieved of his role as chairman of the Senate Energy Committee and vice-chairman of two other Senate panels by Senate President Pro Tempore Mike Schulz when the allegations surfaced in July.