Okla. Stat. tit. 20, § 20-1402

This is the official text of Okla. Stat. tit. 20, § 20-1402, part of Oklahoma’s Stat. tit. 20, — part of the compiled statutory law of Oklahoma, published by the state as "Stat. tit. 20,." Browse the sections below, each linked to its official government source.

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Recusal or disqualification of appellate judges –

Official statutory text

Appointment by Governor.

A. No Justice of the Supreme Court of this state or Judge of

the Criminal Court of Appeals shall participate in the decision of

any appellate cause in which the Justice or Judge presided at the

trial of such cause.

B. When a Justice of the Supreme Court is recused or

disqualified from deciding a cause for any reason, the remainder of

the Court shall decide the cause. If, during the decision of any

cause, there are less than seven (7) qualified Justices, the Clerk

of the Court shall certify all such recusals or disqualifications to

the Governor who shall assign a retired Supreme Court Justice to the

matter in substitution of the recused or disqualified Justices. If

no retired Supreme Court Justice is able to serve, the Governor

shall assign a member of the Bar of this state who possesses the

same qualifications as the members of the Supreme Court to the

matter in substitution of the recused or disqualified Justice.

C. When a Judge of the Court of Criminal Appeals is recused or

disqualified from deciding a cause for any reason, the Clerk of the

Court shall certify the recusal or disqualification along with the

case number to the Governor who shall assign a retired Judge of the

Court of Criminal Appeals to the matter in substitution of the

recused or disqualified Judge. If no retired Judge of the Court of

Criminal Appeals is able to serve, the Governor shall assign a Judge

of the Court of Civil Appeals to the matter in substitution of the

recused or disqualified Judge. If no Judge of the Court of Civil

Appeals is able to serve, the Governor shall assign a member of the

Bar of this state who possesses the same qualifications as the

members of the Court of Criminal Appeals to the matter in

substitution of the recused or disqualified Judge.

R.L. 1910, § 5815. Renumbered from § 574 of Title 22 by Laws 1969,

c. 119, § 1, emerg. eff. April 3, 1969. Amended by Laws 2022, c.

201, § 1.

Status: in_force · Read it on the official government site

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About this page: Statute text is reproduced from official government publishers via the Open US Law dataset (Vaquill AI, snapshot v2026.08, CC BY 4.0). Primary legislative text like this is public domain under the government-edicts doctrine (Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, 2020). We link every section back to its official source so you can verify it independently.