The Troubling Trail of Ron Durbin and Sean Buckner Across Oklahoma
An investigative review of court records, disciplinary proceedings, and documented legal actions
A Camera, a Cause, and a Court Record
They call themselves accountability journalists. They livestream confrontations with public officials, demand citizen's arrests at school board meetings, and frame every legal setback as evidence of a corrupt system conspiring against them. But the documented record of Ron Durbin and his associate Sean Buckner tells a more complicated story — one of a disbarred attorney and his collaborator who have left a trail of dismissed lawsuits, ethics violations, financial sanctions, and rattled communities across Oklahoma.
This is not a story about two crusaders fighting for the little guy. It is a story about what happens when the tools of accountability are weaponized, and what the courts, bar associations, and citizens of Oklahoma have had to do to push back.
Ron Durbin — From Cannabis Attorney to Disbarred Provocateur
The Rise
Ronald Edward Durbin II was licensed to practice law on September 22, 2009, as a member of the Oklahoma Bar Association. For years he carved out a niche as a cannabis industry attorney in Tulsa, advocating for medical marijuana businesses and, by his own account, press freedom and open government. He built a following online and positioned himself as an anti-establishment voice.
But over time, his tactics grew increasingly aggressive. Once a cannabis industry attorney who advocated for press freedom and the integrity of open meetings, his aggressive tactics, chronicled on his YouTube channel, which now has more than 94,000 subscribers, landed him in hot water with the Oklahoma Bar Association.
The Complaints Mount
Durbin became well known across Oklahoma — though not always in ways he intended. Ron Durbin is known for his involvement in the medical marijuana industry and aggressive, profanity-laced diatribes against the judicial system, the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs Control, and the Oklahoma Medical Marijuana Authority.
The complaints against him were numerous and serious. The OBA initiated a Rule 6 proceeding and alleged respondent's professional misconduct. Respondent is currently prohibited from practicing law by an emergency interim order of suspension, and an order of suspension for his failure to comply with Mandatory Continuing Legal Education rules, and an order striking his name from the Roll of Attorneys due to his failure to pay dues.
Among the more striking documented allegations brought before the disciplinary tribunal:
Durbin allegedly brought lawsuits against his ex-wife, her family, and his neighbors "for the sole purpose of causing certain defendants to incur legal expenses." The court found he violated ethics rules prohibiting attorneys from engaging in conduct "involving dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation" or conduct "that is prejudicial to the administration of justice."
Durbin allegedly yelled at Tulsa County District Court Judge Sharon Holmes and called her "drunk" in a courtroom hallway after she asked reporters to conduct interviews in a "designated media area." In his response to the court, Durbin argued his statements were true but did not provide evidence on the record to prove it.
The disciplinary case also examined his conduct toward neighbors. Defendants in a civil action filed counterclaims alleging respondent's conduct in bringing needless litigation caused by respondent's malice. They alleged when they filed a motion to dismiss, respondent countered with an amended petition without substantially amending the petition in order to cause increased legal fees for defendants.
The Disbarment
After analyzing 20 counts of alleged professional misconduct, all nine justices of the Oklahoma Supreme Court agreed to order the disbarring of Tulsa-based former attorney and cannabis advocate Ron Durbin.
The scope of the violations was extraordinary. Allegations of professional misconduct against Ronald E. Durbin II dating to 2017 resulted in the Oklahoma Supreme Court confirming 115 rule violations.
The Court itself acknowledged the case was exceptional. As Justice James Edmondson wrote, Durbin's "disciplinary case is almost in a class by itself for the purpose of comparing different discipline cases for the degree of discipline," due to the number and nature of his violations and "the need for protecting the public, the OBA's members, and the judiciary."
The disbarment is effective from the date of his previous interim suspension. In addition to disbarment, the costs associated with the disciplinary proceedings were imposed on Durbin. Specifically, the Supreme Court ruled Durbin is responsible for $22,152 in legal costs incurred by the state bar during the case.
After Disbarment: Still on the Air
Remarkably, losing his law license did not slow Durbin down. Durbin practiced law in Oklahoma for 15 years before turning his sights on "the injustices in the legal system and the corruption of the Oklahoma Bar Association and judges across Oklahoma." As a consequence, the Oklahoma Bar Association suspended Durbin's license to practice. Durbin now "fights for his First Amendment rights."
He rebranded. His YouTube channel "Guerrilla Publishing" — now repackaged as "Guerrilla News" — continued to grow. And he turned his attention to new targets: school districts, small-town governments, and public officials across Oklahoma.
His stated mission for public education is particularly alarming. Durbin's mission, he said, is to destroy public education.
The human cost of his methods has been documented. Oklahoma Watch quotes irate parents of school children who call Durbin "an immature bully," saying his "allegations are exaggerated, his demeanor disrespectful and his intent nefarious." Two mothers have asked on separate occasions, "Why are we allowing YouTube personalities and online bullying to prevail?"
Sean Buckner — The Plaintiff Who Couldn't Win
The Traffic Stop That Started It All
It started with a broken headlight. Or rather, a high beam that was allegedly out in the middle of the day. That was the justification Officer Houston Murray used to pull over Sallisaw resident Sean Buckner on a routine afternoon.
Buckner, apparently believing he had been wronged, decided to sue. What followed was a legal saga that federal courts ultimately found to be entirely without merit.
A Federal Lawsuit Found Frivolous
A federal lawsuit brought by Buckner against the City of Sallisaw, Sallisaw Police Lt. Houston Murray and Police Chief Terry Franklin was found to be frivolous on March 31, and Buckner was ordered to pay almost $50,000 in attorneys' fees.
Specifically, according to court documents, the magistrate judge ruled Buckner's federal lawsuit to be "frivolous, unreasonable and groundless."
The Failed Appeal and a Second Disbarment
Unwilling to accept this outcome, Buckner appealed — and in doing so, triggered a chain of events that resulted in yet another attorney losing their license.
James A. Conrady of Okmulgee, who filed an appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit as attorney of record for William Sean Buckner after Buckner was ordered to pay more than $50,000 in attorneys' fees, wasn't eligible to practice in the Tenth Circuit appellate court, having been suspended 13 years earlier.
In addition, Conrady failed to self-report to the Oklahoma Bar Association's General Counsel his disbarment from the Tenth Circuit, resulting in Conrady being cited for professional misconduct, and the High Court ruling that "the possibility of [Conrady] continuing to practice law in our state poses too great a danger to its courts and to its people."
In August, then represented by Charles Wilkin II of Tulsa, Buckner abandoned his federal lawsuit, and a motion for voluntary dismissal was filed. The appellate court dismissed the case with prejudice, and let stand the lower court's ruling ordering Buckner to pay more than $50,000 in legal fees.
It is worth noting that Conrady's history was troubling independent of the Buckner case. On April 3, 2012, the High Court suspended him from the practice of law for two years and one day "for shooting up the home of his ex-girlfriend's boyfriend."
The Guerrilla Publishing Operation and the Sallisaw Campaign
A Pattern of Targeting Communities
The link between Durbin and Buckner is not merely associational. Durbin's connection to Sallisaw stems from June 2024 when he and his "investigative journalists," with Buckner in tow, launched campaigns to indict now-former Sallisaw City Manager Keith Skelton, Sallisaw Police Chief Terry Franklin, and the local newspaper.
Their operation describes itself in grandiose terms. Durbin is the face of the social media page Guerrilla Publishing, who describes his YouTube video pursuits as "investigative journalists fighting for civil rights across the United States."
But the courts and independent journalists have reached very different conclusions about the nature of that work. In coverage by Oklahoma Watch, the nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that covers public-policy issues facing the state, Durbin has been characterized as "a disbarred attorney turned social media provocateur" who employs "aggressive, inflammatory tactics."
Behind Closed Doors — Durbin's Divorce, Child Support, and Allegations of Domestic Legal Abuse
A Pattern That Started at Home
Much of Ron Durbin's public persona rests on a simple premise: he is a champion of the powerless against those who abuse authority. But sworn testimony presented before the Oklahoma Supreme Court during his disbarment proceedings reveals a starkly different picture of how he treated those closest to him — including the mother of his child.
$65,000 in Unpaid Child Support
Perhaps the most damning detail buried in the court's 71-page ruling is this: Durbin's former spouse, who appeared at the trial panel hearing pursuant to a subpoena, testified she did not participate with her brother's grievance because she was afraid to testify for fear of repercussions or retaliation by respondent in the case involving custody of her child. She testified she could not go to court to enforce a $65,000 unpaid child support obligation owed by respondent because she owed her current attorney for unpaid fees.
Let that figure settle: $65,000. Owed to the mother of his child. Unpaid. And the reason she had not pursued it in court was not indifference — it was fear. Fear of the man who built a brand around holding others accountable.
Weaponizing the Law Against His Own Family
The testimony before the court also established that Durbin's litigation tactics did not spare his domestic life. A witness testified that respondent had used a frivolous civil case as leverage on the issue of child custody in the divorce proceedings.
This is precisely the behavior the Oklahoma Supreme Court documented in other contexts throughout his disbarment case — using the legal system not to seek justice, but to impose financial pain and fear on those who crossed him. That it extended into his own custody dispute suggests it was not a professional aberration, but a habitual approach.
Threatening Financial Ruin
The court's record captures Durbin's own words directed at his spouse during the divorce. His alleged statements include informing his spouse that because he was an attorney he could ruin her financially in the divorce and her brother would have to foot "one hell of an expensive bill in attorney's fees on his sister's behalf."
This was not a man who simply fought hard in a contentious divorce. This was a licensed attorney allegedly leveraging his professional status as a threat — telling the mother of his child that her family would be financially destroyed if they stood against him.
His Defense: I Am the Victim
True to form, Durbin's response to all of this was to cast himself as the aggrieved party. Respondent stated he is the wronged party in his divorce and child custody proceedings and requested the Court take judicial notice of allegations he made in District Court filings. The Supreme Court flatly rejected this, noting that his own allegations in other proceedings carried no evidentiary weight before them.
Why It Matters
This section of the public record matters not because it is salacious, but because it is revealing. A man who presents himself as a protector of the vulnerable — who livestreams confrontations with city clerks and school board members in the name of accountability — was simultaneously, by sworn testimony, failing to pay $65,000 in child support to a woman too afraid of his retaliation to take him to court. The accountability, it seems, was strictly one-directional.
School Districts in the Crosshairs
In 2025, Durbin turned his attention to Oklahoma public schools, with disturbing effect. In one documented episode, Durbin advised Coweta Public Schools on how to handle recently surfaced sexual assault allegations in a livestream beamed to his more than 33,000 Facebook followers: "You need to pray to God you can settle all these claims in a way that doesn't defund your school system for the next 20 years," Durbin said to the camera during the 30-minute recording made at his home.
The consequences of his involvement at the Coweta school board meeting were significant. A clip of events at the board meeting went viral after being picked up by a large X account, dragging the community into a national spotlight and prompting a biker who attended the meeting to repeat Durbin's estimates of alleged victims and threaten to return if action wasn't taken.
The First Amendment Defense
Durbin has consistently framed his disbarment and legal troubles as retaliation for protected speech. Durbin's lawsuit argues that the suspension violates his constitutional rights, specifically free speech and due process. His legal team says the move to suspend his license amounts to retaliation for his public commentary.
The Oklahoma Supreme Court directly addressed this defense and rejected it. While some of the allegations focus on run-of-the-mill attorney misconduct, the bulk of the complaints filed against him involved the First Amendment audits on his YouTube channel "Guerrilla Publishing," which frequently involved him threatening public employees. The Court was explicit that Durbin's conduct went well beyond protected speech into conduct that warranted the most serious professional sanction available.
What the Record Shows
The documented public record on Ron Durbin and Sean Buckner is extensive and comes from authoritative sources: the Oklahoma Supreme Court, federal district courts, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, the Oklahoma Bar Association, and credible investigative journalism outlets including Oklahoma Watch and the Tulsa World.
That record shows a disbarred attorney found guilty of 115 professional rule violations whose disciplinary case was described by the state's highest court as being "almost in a class by itself." It shows an associate whose federal lawsuit was ruled frivolous, unreasonable, and groundless, and who was ordered to pay $50,000 in sanctions. It shows a social media operation that, by its leader's own admission, aims to destroy public education and that has left rattled school boards, harassed public employees, and alarmed parents in its wake.
Oklahoma has a robust tradition of community accountability and civic engagement. What Durbin and Buckner represent is something different: the exploitation of accountability rhetoric as cover for a pattern of behavior that courts, bar associations, and citizens have repeatedly found harmful to the public interest.
All facts in this article are drawn from publicly available court records, Oklahoma Supreme Court opinions, and reporting by credentialed news organizations including Oklahoma Watch, the Tulsa World, NonDoc, and the Eastern Times Register.
