It was a good week for…
NOLAN RICHARDSON. The former Razorback basketball coach was named to the 2014 class of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
JOSH HASTINGS. Pulaski County prosecutors elected not to retry Hastings, a former Little Rock Police Department officer, on charges of manslaughter in the August 2012 death of Bobby Moore Jr., a 15-year-old Hastings shot during a call at a West Little Rock apartment complex. Prosecutors said they believe Hastings is guilty but didn’t think they could convince a jury of that. Two previous trials ended in mistrial with the jury deadlocked.
DEAD HEATS. The latest Talk Business-Hendrix College polls had the U.S. Senate race between Sen. Mark Pryor and Rep. Tom Cotton and the gubernatorial race between presumptive nominees Mike Ross and Asa Hutchinson as near toss-ups. Pryor led Cotton by 3 percent and Ross led Hutchinson by 1 percent. The margin of error in each poll was 3 percent.
LEGAL SKIRMISHES. Three lawsuits were filed against three separate judicial candidates asking that they be disqualified from running in next month’s judicial elections because their law licenses had been suspended for nonpayment of bar dues. The Arkansas constitution requires judicial candidates to be licensed attorneys for six years immediately preceding the date of assuming office. One of the defendants, Judge H.G. Foster, and the Attorney General’s office have asked the Arkansas Supreme Court to assume jurisdiction in the suits. The Attorney General’s office also suggested to the high court that administrative law license suspensions shouldn’t affect judicial candidates’ ability to run.
It was a bad week for…
GILBERT BAKER. The former state senator resigned his $132,000 position at UCA as lobbyist and administrative assistant to the school’s president in the wake of reporting on his role in the creation of seven political action committees that contributed almost exclusively to Circuit Judge Mike Maggio. Nursing home owner Michael Morton made contributions to all seven of the PACs the same day Maggio held a hearing on a $5.2 million verdict against a Fort Smith nursing home owned by Morton. A few days later, Maggio reduced the verdict to $1 million.
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LAWRENCE HAMILTON. Hamilton, a Broadway actor and the musical director for opera star Jessye Norman who returned to his native Arkansas to direct choral activities at Philander Smith, died in New York after cardiac bypass surgery. He was 59.