The Arkansas Supreme Court today upheld dismissal of a lawsuit claiming the assessment of personal property taxes on royalty owners of producing oil and gas properties was an illegal tax because, among others, it was duplicative of other taxes and not assessed on royalty owners of non-producing property. I’ll let you plow through the legal niceties here. The court noted that the landowners could still present a challenge, by a different means, to the actual assesments for tax purposes.

ALSO AT THE SUPREME COURT: The Supreme Court put under seal records sought by a defense lawyer of incidents in which Little Rock Police Lt. David Hudson used force against people he arrested. The police have contended these are personnel records and exempt from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act because Hudson wasn’t suspended or fired over those incidents. Keith Hall is seeking the records as part of his defense of a restaurant patron Hudson repeatedly punched in the face while working private security. Hudson said the man he punched, Chris Erwin, had refused to leave a private party. Circuit Judge Wendell Griffen has ordered release of the documents, but stayed the order pending an appeal. The Supreme Court said those records should remain sealed while the appeal proceeds.

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