Police chief quits over nude photos wife put on Web

SNYDER, Okla. — The police chief, the mayor and a councilman in Snyder resigned Friday amid an uproar over nude photos of the chief's 300-pound, tattooed wife that she posted on an adult Web site.

Dozens of residents of the town of 1,500 in southwestern Oklahoma had demanded Police Chief Tod Ozmun resign, and the district attorney recommended an obscenity investigation, but the City Council decided last week that the pictures were protected by the First Amendment.

On Friday, Ozmun, Mayor Dale Moore and Councilman Clifford Barnard said they were stepping down because they were fed up with the public attention and criticism of the chief. Another council member resigned earlier over the council's support of Ozmun.

Ozmun's wife, Doris, 43, told The Oklahoman newspaper that she was removing the photos from the Internet, and they appeared to have been taken down Friday.

The police chief said he has had long discussions with his wife about the photos but does not tell her what to do.

"My wife is 6-foot-3 and weighs 300 pounds," said Ozmun, who became chief in January 2005. "If there is somebody that thinks they can control her, have at it. I have tried for 11 years and haven't been able to."

Barnard, the councilman, said he didn't want to be associated with the police chief's detractors, "because I've never read anywhere in the Good Book that the Lord wanted us to persecute those that did not hold the same morals or values."

The mayor told The Oklahoman he believes the way Ozmun has been treated is wrong, and "I don't want to work in a community like this."

District Attorney John Wampler has asked the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation to investigate. "In my opinion, the photos that I was shown are obscene based on local community standards," he said.