Mystery of the Midway flaming hole solved
The mystery of a flaming hole at Midway in mid September leaving emergency personnel scratching their heads has been solved.
Baxter County Office of Emergency Services Director Jim Sierzchula says results of tests point to residue from four chemicals causing the orange flame burning for about 45 minutes, while shooting 10 to 12 feet into the air.
He says the findings are similar to the contents of a Sterno warming fuel can, part sulfur dioxide, ethylene oxide, toulene and xylene.
The tests were conducted by the Arkansas Army National Guard’s 61st Civil Support Team based at Camp Robinson in North Little Rock. Sierzchula says samples of the clay soil were taken from three different levels in the hole and sent to Camp Robinson to be tested.
Sierzchula says authorities do not know how the chemicals were placed in the hole. What they do know is the chemicals would not normally be there.
Sierzchula says thankfully no one was injured in the incident, and no laws were apparently broken.
Following the early morning blaze Sept. 17th, emergency personnel ruled out a gas line, lightening strike and even a meteor as possible causes for the fire.
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Not the first time for MH woman being charged following altercation with knife
A Mountain Home woman, 20-year-old Rebecca Payne, has been arrested and charged following a dispute allegedly leading her to pull a kitchen knife on a man, cutting him lightly on the left side of his neck. Payne’s arrest Wednesday was her third this month, according to records with the Baxter County Sheriff’s Office. Records also indicate she was arrested and charged in 2017 for pulling a knife on a member of management at a local business and threatening to kill her.
in the latest incident, according to the probable cause affidavit, a sheriff’s deputy responded to a residence along Cochran Drive Wednesday where dispatch advised Payne reportedly had a knife and had hurt an individual.
Upon arrival, the deputy observed Payne running from the residence, trying to stay in the shadows of the side yard. When the officer finally was able to stop Payne, she refused to put down the items in her hand, saying the victim had the knife.
With a second deputy arriving on the scene, neither was able to determine Payne still had the weapon on her person, while she continued to refuse to put down the items she was carrying.
When Payne finally dropped the items and the officers began to search for the weapon, the Mountain Home woman began to fight with law enforcement. She was later restrained and taken into custody, leading officers to speak to the man she had allegedly cut with the knife.
He and his wife told officers Payne had been staying with them a couple of days. Earlier in the evening, Payne and the man’s wife got into an argument over a cellphone. The argument reportedly turned physical between the two women, with Payne allegedly pushing the victim’s wife and striking her twice.
When the victim intervened, Payne reportedly attacked him with the kitchen knife. Both the husband and wife declined medical treatment.
The kitchen knife was found in the bathroom of the residence.
Payne has been charged with aggravated assault, third-degree battery and resisting arrest.
Online records with the Baxter County Detention Center website indicate her bond was set at $7,500.
The latest incident with Payne allegedly pulling a knife on an individual is not her first.
In July 2017, she pled guilty to charges filed against her and was given 12 months in prison.
Payne had been charged in connection with two incidents in which she threatened violence or actually committed battery, according to court records.
In one case, Payne was accused of pulling a knife on a member of management at a local business and threatening to kill her after the Mountain Home woman was asked to leave the premises. In the other case, Payne was charged with slipping out of handcuffs and swinging them as a weapon, striking a Baxter County deputy sheriff who had taken her to Baxter Regional Medical Center for treatment.
The deputy asked a witness to the event to call 9-1-1 for assistance, and the call brought four Mountain Home Police Department units to the scene. They were able to place Payne in the deputy’s vehicle, and she was transported back to the jail.
Payne underwent a psychological evaluation and was fit to proceed.
In a petition seeking to set up a guardianship for Payne, it was reported she does have “severe” emotional problems and is developmentally delayed. The petition also described Payne as having “poor impulse control,” among other problems. She was prescribed six psychoactive medications, according to the guardianship petition.
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Evicted renter sits on front porch, refuses to leave residence
A Fulton County woman is facing five felony charges following an altercation with law enforcement after she was found sitting on the porch of the residence she had been renting, refusing to leave.
According to the probable cause affidavit filed Tuesday, Fulton County deputies arrived at the residence along Pops Paradise Lane on Oct. 17th, where they found 45-year-old Tina Marie Freitas. The owner of the residence told officers Freitas had allegedly been beating on the walls of the residence and screaming. He said she had “all but destroyed the residence.”
The deputies determined Freitas had an outstanding child support warrant for her arrest. When asked what was wrong, Freitas told law enforcement it was none of their business, and she wasn’t going anywhere.
When the officers attempted to arrest the Fulton County woman, she allegedly struck both of them in the face several times and kicked one of them in the lower extremities. Freitas reportedly used her fingernails and rings to scratch one of the deputies, before telling them both she was going to kill them. After she was restrained, she continued to try and head-butt one of the officers, before striking her in the nose.
Freitas has been charged with two counts each of terroristic threatening and battery on law enforcement, as well as a single felony count of interference with a law enforcement officer and a misdemeanor count of criminal trespassing.
Her bond was set at $25,000.
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Prison inmate’s request leads to arrests of 4 MH residents
A request from an inmate with the Arkansas Department of Correction has led to the arrest of four Mountain Home residents.
Baxter County Sheriff John Montgomery says the four were arrested Tuesday afternoon on various drug charges when officers conducted an inspection of a home on South Street in Mountain Home. The inmate requested paroling out of prison to the residence.
Officers with the Arkansas Department of Community Corrections found illegal drugs during the inspection of the home. Sheriffs investigators were called to the residence to assist.
Pamela Ritchie was identified as the homeowner. Three other persons were found to be inside the residence as well, including 34-year-old Keturah Sanders-Dicks, who is on parole and under active supervision by ACC.
During the inspection of the main part of the home, officers found approximately one gram of methamphetamine, various controlled substances, including morphine sulfate and oxycodone hydrochloride, and articles of drug paraphernalia.
In a separate bedroom used by Sanders-Dicks officers found another gram of methamphetamine, diazepam, marijuana, and articles of drug paraphernalia.
In addition to the 63-year-old Ritchie and Sanders-Dicks, 56-year-old Marvin Ritchie and 25-year-old Joshua T. Dicks were also transported to the Baxter County Detention Center.
The four are each facing six felony drug-related charges.
Their bonds were set at $15,000 each, and they are set to appear in Baxter County Circuit Court in November.
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Harps denies illegal sale of handgun used to kill elderly couple
Harps Food Stores has denied illegally selling a handgun to convicted murderer Nicholas Roos only a day before he shot and killed an elderly Midway couple during a robbery at their home on County Road 508 in early November 2015.
The denial came in an answer to a lawsuit brought by the estates of the murdered couple — 75-year-old Donald Rice and 71-year-old LaDonna Rice. The Harps’ answer was filed Friday in Washington County Circuit Court. Harps Food Stores is headquartered in Springdale located in Washington County.
The lawsuit filed by the estates alleges Roos and a companion, Talmadge Pendergrass, went to the Harps store at 924 Highway 62 East in Mountain Home and purchased the 9 millimeter handgun used to kill the Rice couple.
The Rice home was ransacked and then set ablaze. It took several days of sifting through the ashes of the large residence before the couple could be identified.
The Rice estates allege Harps’ personnel failed to recognize a type of purchase prohibited by law in which one person buys a weapon for another who is not eligible to make the purchase for a variety of reasons. Roos is alleged to have told Pendergrass he could not buy the gun because of a prior commitment for mental problems, including a suicide attempt.
Scenes from Harps own video surveillance system shows the purchase as it unfolds, including a picture of Roos examining various handguns, handing money to Pendergrass to pay for the weapon and Pendergrass filling out paperwork which should have been completed by Roos as the actual purchaser of the weapon.
In the lawsuit against Harps, it is alleged the clerk who made the sale was a 17-year-old high school senior. It appears from published rules and regulations governing the selling of weapons, a person under 18 can sell them if they have written permission from a parent or guardian and have the document with them at all times.
The answer filed by Harps admits only that the clerk was an employee acting in the course and scope of his employment with the company, but denies allegations the clerk failed to recognize the allegedly illegal purchase.
In the lawsuit by the Rice estates, it is noted Harps sells firearms at three of its stores — including the one on U.S. 62 East in Mountain Home. The company’s answer says currently only two stores located in Mountain Home and Marshall sell weapons.
In one section of the company’s answer, the attorney for Harps writes the company is without sufficient information to address the truth or falsity of the statement contained in the lawsuit filed by the Rice estates that the gun sold at Harps was the one used to kill the couple.
Harps is represented by the Barber Law Firm in Little Rock. The families are represented by the Little Rock law firm of McMath and Woods and two attorneys from Washington, D.C., including one with the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence.
Electronic court records do no yet contain a scheduling order, setting out dates when various events in the suit are to occur.
The lawsuit filed by the Rice estates does not mention a specific dollar figure being sought in damages.
Roos was convicted of the double murder of Donald and LaDonna Rice, robbing and burning their home in late May 2016 and sentenced to life in prison without parole. He is currently appealing that conviction alleging ineffective assistance by the lawyers who were appointed to defend him from the State Public Defender’s Commission. Pendergrass was convicted of making a false statement in acquiring a firearm in November last year in federal court and was sentenced to 16 months in federal prison.
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