Ex-husband speaks out
Lyle Landers, ex-husband of Sara Gilson, said she could not get away from Jeremiah Duffy despite filing multiple protective orders. Landers told People that he had begged her for five years to leave Duffy. “She had been stuck in a relationship where domestic abuse seemed ‘OK’,” Landers said.
Landers, the father of Gilson’s two children, added: “She was a wonderful mother and would die for her children. In fact, her trying to protect children is what ultimately led to her death.”
Timeline of events
Gilson publicly accused Duffy of child sexual abuse in a TikTok video on July 11. Twelve days later, police received a call from a screaming Gilson, and an apparent gunshot was heard. Officers found the bodies of Gilson and Duffy at her home in Owasso, Oklahoma, both with gunshot wounds to the head. Police suspect Duffy killed Gilson then himself.
Court records show Gilson filed for protective orders in 2021, but judges dismissed them after she did not appear. This month, she filed another order which was granted. The judge ordered Duffy out of her home and required him to stay at least 100 yards away. In her application, Gilson wrote that Duffy had threatened suicide and possessed a firearm.
Separate allegations against Duffy
The mother of a 15-year-old girl requested a protective order against Duffy, alleging inappropriate behavior. She said Duffy, a basketball coach, was seen kissing and touching her daughter after another coach walked in on them. Duffy had sent the teen text messages, asked her to his hotel room, and paid her to keep quiet, the mother said.
Police reported that similar conduct had occurred over an extended period across multiple states, according to NBC News. Officers attempted to apprehend Duffy at the school where the allegations occurred but he had left. Over 24 hours, police tracked him via cellphone towers, but he stayed ahead. The Muskogee sheriff’s department flew a drone near a tower his phone had pinged. “He stayed just enough ahead of us that we couldn’t track him down that night,” said Nick Boatman, an Owasso police spokesperson.
Because the alleged crimes took place on Cherokee land and Duffy was a member of the Osage tribe, Owasso police referred the investigation into lewd behavior toward a minor to the US attorney’s office in Tulsa, which has jurisdiction over tribal land. The US attorney’s office and the FBI field office in Tulsa did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
