Courts notebook

Defamation suit before U.S. judge

A defamation lawsuit filed by David Singer, a former employee of the state treasurer's office, against his former bosses was transferred Friday from Pulaski County Circuit Court to federal court, where U.S. District Judge Leon Holmes will decide whether the case should be decided in federal court or returned to state court.

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Singer contends in the lawsuit that Treasurer Dennis Milligan fired him because Milligan thought Singer was "mentally ill," and because Singer had complained about the use of public funds to engage in political activities and harassment. Such complaints are protected by the Arkansas Whistleblower Act, the complaint alleges.

Singer's suit initially named only Jim Harris, Milligan's chief of staff, who it alleges made untrue remarks about Singer to reporters, accusing him of "acting in a bizarre fashion," among other things, after his wife died of breast cancer a year ago.

Singer of White Hall has said he was fired April 27, but Harris wouldn't tell him why. Singer had held the $65,000-a-year job since Jan. 14, the day after Milligan took office. Singer's lawsuit seeks a public "name-clearing hearing."

On June 22, Singer's attorney, Luther Sutter, told Pulaski County Circuit Judge Wendell Griffen that the parties were unable to resolve the lawsuit through mediation.

Feds claim money from arrest theirs

The U.S. attorney's office in Little Rock asked a judge Thursday to order that $791,985 seized by state police in a January traffic stop in Pope County be forfeited to the government.

The cash was found in a semitrailer that Cpl. Chris Goodman pulled over at 9:34 a.m. Jan. 7 on Interstate 40, close to Pottsville, after it swerved onto the right shoulder several times, according to the filing.

The trooper reported that driver Khanh Hoang Pham seemed nervous, and that the logbook indicated that the co-driver, Yue Jiang Zeng, had taken off several days in California prior to the trip, during which the men had delivered cargo to New York while picking up another load.

Inside the truck and trailer, Goodman reported finding a FedEx box and a duffel bag in a side closet, and two bags with locked zippers under a bed that Zeng was sleeping on, all containing rubber-banded bundles of U.S. currency. Zeng said $3,000 in the duffel bag was his, but he denied knowing anything about the bags found under his bed. Prosecutors noted that while Zeng claimed he earned the money doing labor, he was "evasive" about the type of labor and said he couldn't think of the name of the person who paid him.

The men were transported to the Pope County sheriff's office, where Goodman summoned the assistance of the Drug Enforcement Administration. There, prosecutors say, Pham told officers that the only money that belonged to him was $600 found in the logbook, and that it was for fuel. He also told them that Zeng must have sneaked the other money onto the truck while Pham was sleeping. Prosecutors said Zeng later told officers that about $30,000 found in the closet was his but declined a formal interview without a lawyer present.

The prosecutors' complaint said a police dog detected the odor of drugs on the money found in the closet and under the bed, and that swabs of the contents tested positive for cocaine. It asks that except for the $600 found in the logbook, the cash be declared "drug money" and forfeited to the government.

LR businessman's retrial postponed

A retrial for Little Rock businessman John Stacks, who is accused of submitting false claims of damage from a 2008 tornado to the Small Business Administration, has been rescheduled to begin Aug. 15. The trial was to begin July 27.

In October, a federal jury convicted the 60-year-old owner of the Mountain Pure bottling company in Little Rock on seven charges and deadlocked on three other charges. U.S. District Judge Leon Holmes later threw out two of the convictions, saying jurors relied on insufficient evidence, and granted Stacks a new trial on the other five convictions.

That leaves eight charges for a second jury to hear -- the five charges for which he was granted a new trial and the three charges of money laundering on which the first jury hung.

In March, U.S. District Judge Kristine Baker threw out a civil lawsuit that Mountain Pure workers filed against federal agents who executed a search warrant at the business in 2012 that led to the criminal charges. The plaintiffs claimed that their rights were violated during the raid, but Baker said the lawsuit didn't raise any genuine issues.

Denial of reduced sentence upheld

A federal appeals court said Tuesday that Chief U.S. District Judge Brian Miller was right to deny a sentencing reduction to Wayne Earl Jones Jr., who pleaded guilty April 14, 2014, to a charge of conspiring to use a firearm during the commission of a federal drug crime.

Jones and another man were arrested Sept. 13, 2011, as a result of a "reverse sting" operation in which an agent of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives pretended to be a drug courier who needed help robbing a cocaine stash house. Jones and his accomplice, who the ATF had heard were robbing drug dealers in the Little Rock area, agreed to rob the house, kill its two guards and sell the stolen cocaine, according to court documents.

But on the day the plan was to be executed -- after Jones and an accomplice helped plan the robbery and killings in a series of recorded meetings -- they met up with the agent, carrying loaded guns, only to be led to another location where other federal agents were waiting to arrest them.

At sentencing, defense attorney Dale Adams sought a reduced sentence that would have applied unless the circumstances showed that Jones and his accomplice would have completed the plan "but for apprehension or interruption by some similar event beyond their control." Miller found that those circumstances existed, and denied the credit, sentencing Jones to 210 months -- 17½ years -- in prison.

On appeal to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis, Jones argued that he should have received the reduction because the agent-manufactured conspiracy was factually impossible to complete -- because the stash house didn't even exist. A three-judge panel, however, said admitted facts and circumstances supported Miller's conclusion that Jones "would have completed" the job, "but for events beyond his control."

Metro on 07/04/2015

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