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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 7, 2017
Governor Mary Fallin Names Scott Rowland to Court of Criminal Appeals
OKLAHOMA CITY – Governor Mary Fallin today
announced the appointment of Scott Rowland to the Court of Criminal Appeals. Rowland,
of Oklahoma City, succeeds Judge Arlene Johnson, who resigned.
His appointment is effective immediately.
Rowland has served nearly eleven years as first assistant
district attorney for Oklahoma County. Since becoming a prosecutor in 1995,
Rowland has served as general counsel to the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and
Dangerous Drugs Control, and is a former assistant attorney general for the state
of Oklahoma, where he served as a white-collar crime prosecutor from 1994 to
1996.
“Scott Rowland is knowledgeable in criminal law, and has the
right temperament and experience to be an appellate judge,” said Fallin. “He
has proven in his more than 20 years as a public servant to be fair and
respectful.”
As first
assistant in Oklahoma’s largest district attorney’s office, Rowland oversees
about 55 lawyers and 80 support staff, and assists District Attorney David
Prater in managing the office’s $11 million-dollar-per-year budget. He tries capital murder, racketeering, and
conspiracy cases, and he has been cross-deputized as a special assistant U.S. attorney
in the western and northern districts of Oklahoma.
“I’m humbled by Governor Fallin’s confidence in me,” Rowland
said. “Although much of my career has been spent in trial and other litigation
work, I’ve also spent much time studying the growth of the law through
appellate court decisions. An appellate judge must protect our physical safety
from crime and violence on the one hand and our sacred constitutional rights on
the other. The indelible right of all to be safe in their homes and on the
streets must be protected without abridging or sacrificing the constitutional
rights of the accused. To have either of these without the other fails to serve
a basic aim of our democracy.”
Rowland has a bachelor’s degree in journalism/political science
from the University of Oklahoma and a juris doctorate with honors from the Oklahoma
City University School of Law.
Rowland has been an adjunct instructor of criminal and
constitutional law at Oklahoma State University-Oklahoma City since 1998. He and his wife, Shannon, live in Oklahoma
City with their daughters, Caroline and Emma.
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 Scott Rowland
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