Good morning,
I hope everyone is finding innovative ways to beat this heat! Be sure to check on your elderly neighbors and keep fresh water for your pets. We had an incident this week involving a heat-related incident I will cover later in my report.
We continue to work on several important cases that occurred before I took office in January. A lot of my week has been spent with Arkansas State Police investigators doing interviews and reviewing some older case files. Some evidence is being sent to the Arkansas State Crime Lab for testing in one of these cases. We are working closely with Fordyce Police Department on some newer cases and hope to conclude some of those soon. With that said, we remain committed to curtailing drug activities across our county. Our retirement plan seems to be working somewhat as we have seen a decrease in the overt selling of drugs that was going on when I took office. Kudos to my deputies for their hard work on working diligently on the drug/theft problems. We keep rooms available for these people dealing drugs and stealing in our County. The amenities include all stainless-steel appliances, a gated community, and a private gym, and free meals!
The heat-related incident occurred at Ben Few Campgrounds on Wednesday. Captain Keith Axsom responded and performed CPR on a subject that had collapsed until ambulance personnel arrived. Unfortunately, the victim passed away. Many people don't realize that part of a deputy's added responsibility is to perform medical attention to citizens in distress. We all receive specialized training as first responders to deal with these situations. We currently have two deputies that have advanced certifications in first aid. I want to stress to stay hydrated and take frequent breaks while working out in this extreme heat we are experiencing this summer.
On another note, we have worked several accidents on rural county roads this week/month. Arkansas Statute 27-51-216 states that on any county road that does not have a posted speed limit by the county judge the required speed limit shall be 40MPH. This is just a reminder to slow down while traveling these rural county roads. I have witnessed some driving in excess of 70MPH and this is unacceptable. Be safe and respect everyone else's safety while operating a vehicle! The "speeding wrecks lives" campaign continues until the end of July. You will see increased efforts to address increased speed limit violations. According to statistics, 29% of all fatal crashes in the United States are attributed to speeding!
Moving on to felony Friday!
* Darius Robinson - Failure to Appear Warrant
* Webster Brown - Driving on a suspended license, resisting arrest, refusing to submit to arrest, possession of controlled substance.
* Robert W. Hrabal - Driving while intoxicated (DWI)
* Lazar Styles - Driving while intoxicated (DWI)
* Jordan Hammond - Absconding, fleeing, obstructing governmental operations, failure to notify by a mandated reporter. (first degree)
* Zachary Mclure - Absconding
* Amanda Pennington - Driving while intoxicated (DWI)
*Zamirra Brown - Furnishing prohibited articles into a detention facility.
* Antonio Raymond - Possession of controlled substance.
* Frank Tatum - Fleeing (Fordyce Police Department)
Several misdemeanor warrants were served this week. We continue to work on old warrants as time allows. If you have a current warrant with us, I encourage you to come in and make arrangements to pay. Eventually, this will catch up to you and you may spend some time in jail depending on the severity of the warrant. Your driver's license may be suspended due to an active warrant as well.
Mr. Rucker and his crew completed mowing at the Health Department and OEM offices. He assisted the Dallas County Medical Center with moving some furniture. His crew picked up trash on highway 229 from highway 8 to Zion church, from highway 273 to highway 167. Maintenance was completed on several things at the Dallas County Detention Center.
Have a great weekend!!
God Bless,
Sheriff Mike Knoedl