Suspect in deputies’ deaths allegedly choked mom

SEMINOLE, Okla. — An Oklahoma man jailed in the shooting deaths of two deputies was wanted for allegedly trying to strangle his mother, who told authorities that she and her other children were afraid of him, court records show.

Two years ago, his sister said in a filing for a protective order that she feared he would kill somebody.

Ezekiel Holbert, 26, was arrested Sunday after two Seminole County deputies were killed while trying to serve an arrest warrant for Holbert at his mother’s home, State Bureau of Investigation spokeswoman Jessica Brown said.

Holbert was arrested on two first-degree murder complaints and was being held Monday in the Seminole County jail. Seminole County District Attorney Chris Ross said Holbert would be formally charged later Monday. No details were available on whether he has an attorney.

The warrant that deputies were trying to serve was for failing to make a court appearance after Holbert was released on bond in a domestic violence case in February. In that case, his mother told police he tried to strangle her after he was inhaling paint thinner, court records show. According to an affidavit, “Ms. Holbert and her kids are in fear of Ezekiel’s explosive behavior.”

A stipulation of his bond was that he stay away from his mother’s house, Ross said. Holbert’s mother called the sheriff’s office Sunday after finding him in her home, which is about 50 miles from Oklahoma City.

Brown said the two deputies tried to serve the arrest warrant, but were immediately shot.

“They both were hit within moments of the door opening,” Brown said. “I don’t know if they even had the opportunity to return fire.”

One deputy died at the scene and the second died on the way to the hospital, Brown said. She identified them as Robbie Chase Whitebird, 23, who had been with the sheriff’s office since April 2008, and Marvin Williams, 43, who was hired by the agency in 2002.

Neighbor Jennifer Bowen, 22, had just returned from a walk with her two children when a bullet hit her arm and entered her chest, said her mother-in-law, Janet Bowen. She was in serious condition at the University of Oklahoma Medical Center in Oklahoma City, a hospital spokesman said.

Holbert previously was convicted of a misdemeanor count of outraging public decency in Oklahoma County and was the defendant in a case in which a Shawnee man sought a protective order against him.

Holbert’s sister, Tamara Rodriguez, filed for a protective order against him in June 2007, claiming he threatened to kill her husband and her children.

“I’m so scared for my family that he is going to kill someone,” Rodriguez wrote in the petition. “He has three guns in the house that he brags about that he is going to shoot my husband with.”

The order was dismissed in July 2008 after Rodriguez filed a petition to do so, saying she had moved to Texas and had not had any problems with her brother for almost a year.