Prosecutor has troopers search sheriff’s records

2011 arrest seen at crux of probe

A special prosecutor is investigating the Carroll County sheriff’s office regarding a 2011 drug arrest that was later dropped by the prosecuting attorney’s office.

A subpoena and any information gleaned through a search warrant are sealed, said Jack McQuary, the special prosecutor assigned to the case.

“I can’t comment on any open investigations,” McQuary said. “I can’t go into what we were looking for or going after, but I have been appointed as a special prosecutor looking into an incident or incidents in Carroll County.”

Sheriff Bob Grudek said Arkansas State Police executed a search warrant at the department’s dispatch center in Berryville on Jan. 7. Investigators took two computer hard drives that once contained police dash-camera videos, said Grudek. Everything on the hard drives had been destroyed by a lightning strike, he said.

“They seized broken hard drives,” said Grudek. “There’s nothing on it.”

Sheriff’s office employees helped the state police technicians retrieve documents from the computer system during the search, Grudek said. But all of the documents had previously been sent to state police, the sheriff said.

“Several months ago they hit us with a subpoena, and we gave them all the documents related to the case,” Grudek said. “Then they come with a search warrant saying, ‘We don’t believe you gave us all the documents we asked for so we’ve sent our technicians to get the rest of the documents.’”

Grudek said the investigation concerns the Oct. 9, 2011, arrest of Jack Cody Mayes,who is now 28.

Deputy Charles W. Dale stopped Mayes in Berryville after he observed that the red Chevrolet Tahoe that Mayes was driving had a defective license plate lamp, according to a probable-cause affidavit. Mayes was arrested and charged with possession of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia. Dogs were called in to sniff for drugs in the Tahoe, which required extra time, said Grudek.

According to the affidavit, Mayes was stopped at 12:56 a.m. and the K9 unit arrived at 1:24 a.m.

Grudek said time apparently became an issue in Mayes’ defense, with Public Defender Robert “Beau” Allen claiming the search took too long.

But Carroll County Circuit Judge Kent Crow ruled otherwise after a hearing last spring.

Crow scheduled a second hearing and called a police dispatcher, Ryan Hand, to testify as to why time stamps in the computer system didn’t match other records regarding the arrest. Grudek said Hand had written the notes by hand and typed them into the computer later, so the computer showed the time the notes were transcribed into the system, not the time the call came in from officers in the field.

“We have a dispatcher who failed to enter the info into the system correctly, and if he had done it correctly this time wouldn’t be an issue,” said Grudek.

Grudek said Arkansas Crime Information Center records reflect the correct times regarding the search and arrest. The sheriff said he couldn’t remember how much time was in dispute.

After the ruling, Allen asked Crow to recuse himself from the case, but Crow declined.

The county prosecutor’s office then stopped pursuing the case. Crow said he received a letter in June stating that the special prosecutor had been appointed.

“I have not heard anything about what the state police is investigating or looking for,” said Crow. “I know that one happened shortly after the other. The prosecutor decided not to prosecute the Mayes case “shortly after winning thesuppression hearing, which was somewhat unusual,” he said.

Tony Rogers, the county’s lead prosecutor, said he had no comment. Allen didn’t return a telephone message seeking comment.

Northwest Arkansas, Pages 7 on 01/16/2013

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