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A custody hearing in Ada, Oklahoma, last month took a turn for the unexpected — and the incredibly loud — after an attorney who identified himself as transgender was arrested and dragged from the courtroom where he had appeared to represent his client just minutes before.
The exchange occurred during a custody hearing in Pontotoc County, Oklahoma, some 90 minutes southeast of Oklahoma City. The attorney, Rob Hopkins, was jailed for contempt after sparring repeatedly with the judge, Lori Jackson, during an otherwise unremarkable proceeding.
Surveillance footage, audio, and body camera footage reviewed by Fox News Digital has shed new light on the extraordinary confrontation, in which Hopkins can be seen actively resisting arrest by bailiffs. At one point, Hopkins can be seen splaying his body across the judge’s bench, resulting in a pile of documents being swept off its finely polished wood surface.
“You’re HURTING ME!” Hopkins bellowed, as bystanders looked on. “I can’t BREATHE!” he shrieked again, louder.
Attendees in the courtroom could be seen looking on quietly as Hopkins twisted, turned, and contorted his body to evade the handcuffs that officers used to restrain him.
“I felt very threatened by this person,” one individual could be heard telling the judge.
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(Surveillance footage provided to Fox News Digital by the Oklahoma District Attorney’s Office, 22nd District.)
The meltdown in question, and the arrest, occurred during a custody hearing punctuated by repeated interruptions from Hopkins and warnings from Jackson that he would be held in contempt.
Hopkins then suggested she was discriminating against him for his transgender status, escalating tensions inside the courtroom.
“It’s because I’m a transgender attorney practicing all over the state,” Hopkins leveled sharply, to which Jackson shot back: “I don’t know what you are.”
“I don’t know you from Adam,” Jackson said later, describing his conduct as “entirely inappropriate.”
Shortly after, bailiffs entered the courtroom, prompting the hearing to descend into complete chaos.
“Do NOT HURT ME!” Hopkins yelled at the officers.
“I’m being thrown down!” he bellowed, as he threw himself on the bench before the officers eventually forced him onto the floor.
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More officers streamed in to help restrain Hopkins, whose uproarious exclamations had, at that point, drawn a crowd — not only in the courtroom, but also in the hallways surrounding it, as the body camera footage shows.
“Get a female officer, now!” Hopkins demanded. “Call 911!” he shrieked, as the officers attempted to place him in handcuffs.
“I can’t breathe! I can’t breathe!” he declared.
From the floor of the court, Hopkins accused the officers of “throwing his glasses” onto the floor — a claim that surveillance footage reviewed by Fox News Digital appears to refute — and ordered the officers to place them back on his face.
“Put them on my face,” Hopkins demanded repeatedly, as the officers attempted to place Hopkins into a seated position and escort him from the court. “PUT THEM ON MY FACE!” Hopkins screamed once more, the volume and urgency unchanged from his request for emergency services just seconds before.
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Rob Hopkins, a transgender lawyer in Oklahoma, was jailed for contempt during a procedural hearing in Ada, Oklahoma, last month after a viral meltdown. ( Oklahoma District Attorney’s Office, 22nd Prosecutorial District.)
Hopkins said he has since shuttered his law firm following the contempt charge and fallout from the hearing.
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He did not respond to Fox News Digital’s requests for comment regarding either the proceedings in question or the reason for his firm’s closure.
