City ends effort to enjoin house

Property owner agrees to bar man arrested on drug counts

Little Rock officials on Friday formally ended an effort to place the former home of an accused drug dealer under court supervision because the property owners have promised that the man will never be allowed to live on the property again.

ADVERTISEMENT

More headlines

Pulaski County Circuit Judge Tim Fox signed off on the agreement that ends a city lawsuit against the owners of 3301 Asher Ave.

Citing the January 2016 police raid that led to the arrest of a man at the house on drug-dealing charges, city officials called for the 71-year-old rental home to be ruled a nuisance as a "threat to the health, safety and welfare" of Little Rock residents. The home is across the street from Total Outreach For Christ Church.

Such a finding would have given the judge control of the property to order any improvements he deemed necessary, upon advice from city officials, including the authority to have the house demolished. The owner could be fined for not following those orders.

But Deputy City Attorney Cliff Sward told Fox that the city will not seek sanctions under the agreement reached with property owner Hurston C. Simpson Revocable Trust. The trust has promised to never allow 40-year-old Torrioan Leveal "Tory" Neal to live at the house at the corner of Asher and Bowen streets.

Trust attorney Don Eilbott told the judge that Neal was not a tenant but that he had been staying as the guest of a woman who was renting the home. The woman no longer lives at the house, he said.

Neal was arrested in a raid at the 728-square-foot home early last year by police who seized 4 ounces of marijuana, divided into 13 small plastic bags, along with digital scales and two pistols, one of them stolen. Police also seized $9,537 that they claim are the profits from drug dealing, court filings show.

Neal was indicted by federal authorities in November on charges of felon in possession of a firearm, possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug-trafficking crime and possession with intent to distribute marijuana.

He was released from jail in November after spending about 10 months in custody and is scheduled to stand trial in June before U.S. District Judge James Moody.

Court records show he's been sentenced to prison four times since he was 19, three times for drug dealing. He received his first felony conviction for participating in cocaine trafficking in 1993 when he was 17.

Metro on 01/14/2017

Upcoming Events