Petty to run for third District 94 House term

State Rep. Rebecca Petty, R-Rogers
State Rep. Rebecca Petty, R-Rogers

ROGERS — State Rep. Rebecca Petty, R-Rogers, announced Monday her bid for a third term for Rogers’ District 94 House seat.

Petty is a consultant on crimes against children and crime victim issues to the U.S. Department of Justice. She’s known as an advocate for crime victims and for tightening laws on crimes against children as a legislator. She serves on the House Judiciary Committee.

Petty partnered with Rep. Greg Leding, D-Fayetteville, and Sen. Missy Irvin, R-Mountain View, in the regular session of 2017 to allow parole for those serving life sentences for crimes committed when they were juveniles. The lawmakers co-sponsored the bill that passed earlier this year, which became Act 539.

Petty was a leading opponent to a more lenient version of that bill proposed by Leding in 2015.

“The bill as previously written would have allowed parole after 20 years for capital murder, and that just was not sufficient,” Petty said.

She also objected to what she said was a lack of notification and involvement in the parole process for surviving victims, including family. She, Leding, Irvin and advocate groups for crime victims and advocates for juveniles extensively revised the proposal for 2017. Petty took the lead in getting the legislation passed. One of Petty’s daughters, Andi, was murdered in 1999.

Petty’s Democratic opponent in the last general election said Petty’s focus, while admirable, came at the expense of her district’s priorities. She responded no issue in her district goes neglected for the sake of criminal justice improvement. Voters gave Petty her second term with more than 54 percent of the vote.

“I feel like what I know that others haven’t lived through brings something valuable to the table,” she said.

Petty sponsored Act 957 of 2015, which allows child witnesses to have a trained therapeutic dog with them when testifying at trial. The trained animals are considered by experts to relieve the stress for children testifying about crimes committed against them.

No opponent has announced to challenge Petty. Filing for partisan office begins in February and ends March 1. Petty faced primary opponents in both her races before and also faced opposition in the general election each time. Her initial race for the state House in 2014 was her first political race.

Doug Thompson can be reached by email at dthompson@nwadg. com or on Twitter @NWADoug.

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