Ex-prosecutor Harmon wins acquittal in drug-selling trial

Former prosecutor Dan Harmon waits Thursday for his trial on drug charges to begin at the Grant County Courthouse in Sheridan.
Former prosecutor Dan Harmon waits Thursday for his trial on drug charges to begin at the Grant County Courthouse in Sheridan.

— Dan Harmon, a former prosecutor who served time in federal prison for public corruption, was acquitted Thursday of drug charges that threatened to send him to prison for the rest of his life.

It took a jury 30 minutes to find the 65-year-old permanently disbarred lawyer from Benton innocent of two counts of delivery of a controlled substance, which stemmed from allegations that he gave women powerful prescription painkillers in exchange for cash and a peek at their breasts last year.

Harmon was arrested Feb. 17 in Sheridan, the Grant County city where he once prosecuted criminals, about two months after police said they made controlled buys from him on two different days using a drug informant.

He was prosecutor for Grant, Saline and Hot Spring counties from 1979-80 and from 1991-96. In 1996, he entered a plea deal in state court regarding beating up former Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reporter Rodney Bowers and fighting with two sheriff ’s deputies in Benton and was thereby forced from office.

Before his resignation, a federal grand jury indicted him, and in 1997 a jury convicted him of running a public-corruption scheme, including extorting money and drugs from criminal defendants in exchange for dropped charges. In a separate trial shortly after, he was convicted of federal drug crimes.

He was released from prison in 2006 and had completed his supervised release by the time he was arrested by a city officer in Sheridan.

The jury of seven women and five men, including at least one juror who acknowledged having met Harmon before Thursday, were not told during the one-day trial of his criminal history. He was described as retired.

He didn’t take the stand.

“I just want to thank the jury and say God bless you,” Harmon, white-haired and less confrontational than during past troubles, told reporters after the verdict was announced.

One charge, alleging delivery of morphine tablets, carried a maximum sentence of life in prison, and the charge relating to hydrocodone, a lesser felony, was punishable by up to 20 years.

Prosecutors also were asking for sentencing enhancements that could have added another 10 years in prison. That enhancement was based on the location of the North Red Street apartments where police claimed the exchanges took place, which is within 1,000 feet of a school.

“His fate, his future is really in your hands,” defense attorney Mark Hampton told jurors before they began deliberations at 5:45 p.m.

The state’s key testimony came from former Sheridan resident Mary Daugherty, who said that while working as an informant on Dec. 10,she and her friend showed their breasts to Harmon in exchange for two hydrocodone pills each.

Six days later, she gave Harmon $50 - cash provided by a narcotics officer - for morphine pills, she told the jury.

“I was not going to show my breasts again,” the widowed mother of three said indignantly from the stand.

Daugherty, blond-haired and wearing a scoop-neck, form-fitting T-shirt and capri pants, admitted that she once was hooked on painkillers and began working for police to avoid her own potential prosecution on drug charges.

But two women who also were at the apartment complex when the alleged transactions occurred disputed her claims that Harmon supplied her with pills.

Amber Luker, a one-time friend of Daugherty’s who also was under contract to be a confidential informant for the Group 6 Narcotics Enforcement Unit, said she saw no drug deals and never showed her breasts.

“Did you see Harmon exchange any kinds of drugs for money?” Hampton asked.

“No, sir,” said the thin 30-year-old with long dark hair, who sipped water and kept her purse on her shoulder while on the stand.

Luker said she and several other women, most whom were around age 30 and raising young children, were hanging out at a friend’s apartment having “girl talk” while Harmon was there visiting.

Kristy Mir, who was part of that “girl talk,” also said she saw no drug deals. Mir said Harmon took her to the friend’s apartment to visit, a favor she said Harmon would frequently do for her.

Special prosecutor H.G. Foster expressed disbelief that a man twice the women’s age was simply hanging out, being friendly, doing favors. He called Luker and Mir’s testimony unbelievable.

The prosecutor said the testimony of drug agent Eddie Keathley and Daugherty were more “reasonable” than one theory by Hampton that Daugherty picked Harmon’s pocket for the hydrocodone pills, which were turned into police in a prescription bottle with Harmon’s name on it.

Hampton pointed out what he saw as flaws in the investigation, pointing to Keathley having no audio or video recordings of the alleged drug buys and the fact the agent only saw Harmon at the apartments during one buy and couldn’t say exactly from which apartment he’d emerged.

“I thought the evidence was horribly weak,” Hampton said after hugging his client, whom he’s known for years.

Foster, when asked if he thought flaws in the investigation played a role in the acquittal, said: “It’s just the nature of narcotics enforcement.”

The verdict was met with a quiet chorus of “yes” from a few Harmon supporters.

The courtroom also hosted Harmon foes, including Linda Ives, a mother of one of two teenagers who were killed on train tracks in Saline County in 1987.

Harmon once led a grand jury investigation into their deaths, which remain unsolved. Eventually, Ives became fiercely critical of Harmon and many others involved in the case.

Circuit Judge Chris Williams dismissed court without letting Harmon address the jury. The judge praised the attorneys, saying it was one of the “cleanest” trials he’s presided over.

Front Section, Pages 1 on 06/25/2010

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