Prosecutor to review complaint on judge
Posted on Wednesday, September 26, 2007
HOPE — A special prosecutor has been assigned to look into a complaint that Arkansas Supreme Court Justice Jim Gunter struck his sister and pushed her down during a family dispute at their father’s home this month.
Gunter was not arrested in the confrontation, which was classified as a possible thirddegree battery on a Hempstead County sheriff’s office report filed Sept. 4.
Third-degree battery is a class A misdemeanor, punishable by up to one year in jail and a fine of up to $ 1, 000.
Gunter, 64, did not return telephone messages left for him Tuesday at his office in Little Rock and his home in Hope.
His sister, Janet Gibson, 62, of Dade City, Fla., told a reporter by telephone that the incident was “a private matter.”
“It’s over,” she said from her Florida home when asked if she planned to cooperate with investigators in the case. “It’s done and over.”
Chris Thomason, the prosecuting attorney in Hope, said he contacted the state’s prosecutor coordinator and filed a motion to recuse himself from considering possible charges.
“He [Gunter ] actually swore me in to practice law,” Thomason said of his reasons for asking to recuse. “He’s been very pivotal in my professional career, and I know the family real well.”
Bob McMahan, the state’s prosecutor coordinator, said he was asked to select a prosecutor to fill in for Thomason.
“I had received an order from [Eighth-North Circuit ] Judge Randall Wright and he asked me to recommend a person to serve as a special prosecutor,” McMahan said. “The current prosecutor had filed a petition alleging that a conflict existed, and I would agree he did have a conflict.”
McMahan recommended Pulaski County Prosecuting Attorney Larry Jegley to be the special prosecutor handling the case. McMahan said Wright has issued an order affirming the recommendation.
Jegley declined to comment on the case when contacted Tuesday.
Hempstead County Chief Deputy James Singleton also declined to comment on the specifics of the case, but said he has spoken with Jegley.
According to the incident report by Hempstead County Deputy Jerry Crider, Gibson suffered “minor injury” in the confrontation, which was said to have occurred two days earlier at the home of their 88-year-old father, J. H. Gunter.
“Upon my arrival, I met with Janet Gibson,” Crider wrote. “Janet stated that on 9-2-07, at approximately 1630 hours, she was assaulted by her brother, Jim Gunter. Janet stated that Jim is an Arkansas Supreme Court Judge.”
Gibson told the deputy that her brother had brought some genealogy papers to their father’s home on Aug. 31, and that she was supposed to look at the papers in preparation for a Sept. 2 family reunion in Hope.
She said that after returning from the reunion, she put the papers in a bedroom.
“Janet stated that Jim came into the living room area and asked her what she had done with his stuff,” the report continues. “Janet stated that she told Jim she was not through with the update on the papers and she would get them back to him when she was through.”
Gibson told the deputy that the Supreme Court justice began “screaming at her about bothering his stuff” and that she followed him into the bedroom to talk to him.
“Janet stated that she walked up behind Jim and he swung his arm around and backhanded her across the mouth, knocking her into the dresser, causing her to fall across the dresser,” Crider wrote. “Janet stated that as she was attempting to get off of the dresser, Jim turned towards her and put his hand in her shoulder and shoved her to the floor.”
The deputy noted in his report that Gibson had some visible signs of injury.
“I did observe Janet’s top lip to be swelled up, and it was cut on the inside,” he wrote. “Janet also had a large bruise on the lower part of her back on the left side, just above her waist line.”
Investigators photographed Gibson’s injuries and those photographs are included in the file presented to Jegley, Singleton said.
According to Canon 2 of the Arkansas Code of Judicial Conduct, “a judge shall respect and comply with the law and shall act at all times in a manner that promotes public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the judiciary.”
In the commentary describing the rule, the authors of the code explain, in part, that “a judge must expect to be the subject of constant public scrutiny. A judge must therefore accept restrictions on the judge’s conduct that might be viewed as burdensome by the ordinary citizen and should do so freely and willingly.”
A former Hempstead County prosecuting attorney, Gunter was elected as chancery judge in 1983 and circuit judge in 1999. He was elected to the Supreme Court in 2004.
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