Photo: Brandon Brown
A Mountain Home man pled no contest to charges he stole items from boat docks in the Pigeon Creek arm of Lake Norfork and was sentenced to time in prison during a session of Baxter County Circuit Court last week.
Twenty-three-year-old Brandon Brown was given a six-year prison sentence, with three to serve and three suspended. Victim restitution in the case has yet to be determined.
Brown was arrested along with a female co-defendant in May. The incident leading to the arrests began when a witness reported he had been fishing in the area where the boat docks were located in the early morning hours of May 24.
The man told investigators he saw a male and female in an older model pickup truck in the area. He said there were items in the bed of the truck partially covered with a tarp.
The witness said he had talked to the couple at one point because they were having issues with the truck and needed a jump-start. He said he saw a blue and white ski tube in the truck he believed belonged to a friend of his who owned one of the private docks in the area.
The man notified the dock owner of the early morning encounter. The owner called the sheriff’s office later in the day, when he saw a truck matching the description he had been given by his friend drive by his house headed toward his dock.
Responding Baxter County deputies first made contact with the female — 38-year-old Tina Hollis. Brown was arrested later when he was found hiding in an inflatable rubber canoe.
Photo: Tina Hollis
The deputies reported seeing items in the truck appearing as if they could have come from a boat dock – including a ski rope, gas grill, fishing equipment and a kneeboard. According to court records, Brown and Hollis were unable to provide a believable story as to how the items wound up in the truck.
Hollis was given a five-year probation sentence for her part in the crime. She had to appear in two court sessions to get the plea completed. During her first appearance in late June, she tried to say she was innocent but pleading guilty. She said she was making the unusual plea so she could get out of jail and reclaim her mother’s ashes that were in the truck seized by law enforcement.
Circuit Judge John Putman told her the guilty-but-innocent plea wouldn’t work. He said in making such a plea “either you committed perjury by lying about your guilt, or you lied when you said you weren’t guilty.” The conflicting statements could not both be true, Judge Putman told Hollis.
When she reappeared in early August, Hollis finally settled on a guilty plea and was sentenced
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