Law Enforcement

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Brown, William (Execution of)

William Brown was executed on October 19, 1838, in Pope County for murdering his pregnant wife. Brown and his wife had immigrated to Arkansas from around Concord, North Carolina. By 1838, they had five children, the eldest fourteen years old and the youngest two years old. Mrs. Brown was pregnant when her husband killed her on June 15, 1838. According to the Weekly Arkansas Gazette, the Browns’ children said that Brown had threatened his wife on that day, pointing his rifle at her as she hid behind a tree until “he finally told her to not make a fool of herself, that he did not intend to injure her.” Mrs. Brown then left her shelter and sat down under a …

Burnett Family (Executions of)

Three members of the Burnett Family were hanged in late 1845 for the brutal murder of Johnathan Selby, “a well to do bachelor about forty years of age,” near Cane Hill (Washington County). A neighbor found Johnathan Selby’s body on the morning of August 12, 1845, “his head literally chopped to pieces.” As investigators sought Selby’s killer, suspicion fell on Crawford and Lavinia Burnett and their son John, who lived in the area, and whose nephew John Sharp worked in Cane Hill. The elder Burnetts were taken into custody while their son fled the area. A special session of the circuit court was convened to try Crawford and Lavinia Burnett; future governor Isaac Murphy of Huntsville (Madison County) was among …

Burnett, Henry (Execution of)

Henry Burnett was a young African American man hanged near Lonoke (Lonoke County) on August 27, 1885, for the axe murder of an acquaintance. In the 1880 federal census, Henry Burnett was a twelve-year-old classified as a “mulatto” living in Lonoke County’s Tollette Township with his father, farmer laborer William Burnett, mother Cologne, and three siblings. One of their neighbors was laborer Nelson Anderson, twenty-nine, who lived in the same township with his wife Lizzie and two daughters. Henry Burnett was later described as “slight with somewhat pleasant features,” though “his temper was fierce and ungovernable.” In mid-February 1885, Henry Burnett (then eighteen), Willis Butler, and Anderson traveled five miles to Carlisle (Lonoke County) to conduct some business, with Anderson …

Caldwell, Charles (Execution of)

Charles Caldwell was an African American man hanged at Jonesboro (Craighead County) on April 29, 1893, in the first legal public execution in Craighead County. His corpse was afterward used in a bizarre experiment with electric batteries. Charles Caldwell and Tab Freeman, whom he would later be charged with murdering, both lived at Big Bay, a sawmill station for the Kansas City and Memphis Railroad about ten miles east of Jonesboro, now the community of Bay (Craighead County). Freeman lived with a woman of whom Caldwell was also enamored, leading to bad blood between the two—Freeman at one point tried to kill Caldwell with an axe. The two men were part of a group playing cards at the woman’s house …

Capital Punishment

aka: Death Penalty
The death penalty was practiced in Arkansas even before the state was admitted to the Union in 1836, with the first legally sanctioned execution reportedly occurring at Arkansas Post in 1820. The Arkansas criminal code provides for the death penalty or life without parole upon conviction of capital murder or treason. Those convicted of rape were also subject to the death penalty until January 1, 1976, prior to the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Coker v. Georgia that a death sentence for rape of an adult woman was disproportionate to the crime and violated the Eighth Amendment. The first Arkansas penitentiary was authorized in 1838. Shortly thereafter, the state purchased ninety-two acres for $12 per acre and authorized $80,500 to …

Carroll, George (Execution of)

George Carroll, convicted of drowning his wife, was hanged at Searcy (White County) on April 30, 1886, one of two Arkansans to die on the gallows that day. George Carroll, who “bears a hard name” in his hometown of Beardstown, Tennessee, by 1885 was living on a farm about ten miles north of Searcy with his wife Lizzie, their two children, and his half brother’s widow Vina (or Vinia) Tidwell, who would help the twenty-five-year-old Carroll with farmwork as his wife kept house. Carroll and Tidwell became “so intimate that he decided to murder his wife to get rid of her.” He originally plotted to kill Lizzie Carroll, described as “a highly educated lady, and an earnest, industrious wife,” by …

Carter, Nathan (Execution of)

Nathan Carter, who was hanged at Helena (Phillips County) on January 19, 1893, was one of two African American men executed for the murder of Prince Maloy, a “well to do negro planter.” Prince Maloy, fifty-nine, and his wife Matilda, fifty-one, lived on Island No. 64 in Phillips County’s Mooney Township south of Helena with their son William, age eighteen. Maloy hired local men—including Nathan Carter, Isom White, and his step-son Henry Young—to work in his fields, and their relationships could be tense; a newspaper report said that a few weeks before Christmas 1890 they got into an argument, “and but for the prompt interference of Molloy’s [sic] wife they would have killed the old man.” Maloy was known to …

Cary, James Alexander

James Alexander Cary, a park policeman at Hot Springs National Park from 1923 to 1927, was the first employee of the National Park Service to be murdered in the line of duty. His body was found on March 12, 1927, in Hot Springs National Park within a few feet of the spot where he had arrested men transporting illegal whiskey across federal property three months before. The case remains officially unsolved. James Cary was born on December 19, 1895, in Osage, Missouri, to Lillie D. Cary and James B. Cary. He grew up on a family farm in Osage as the third of five children. On June 1, 1917, Cary joined the U.S. Navy and served until February 4, 1919. …

Casat, Deno (Execution of)

Deno Casat was hanged at Little Rock (Pulaski County) on August 17, 1883, for the murder of an Iron Mountain Railroad employee. Deno Casat and his father Isador both worked at the Iron Mountain Railroad shops in Argenta (now North Little Rock in Pulaski County), but the elder Casat was fired from his job as a mechanic. The pair drank heavily during the morning of October 31, 1882, and around 1:45 p.m., Isador Casat shot himself in the head and died. Deno Casat went to the train shops about three hours later looking for R. M. Richardson, who had fired his father, but instead encountered George Barnes, the bookkeeper and head clerk of the shops. As other railroad workers watched, …

Casey, Frank (Execution of)

Frank Casey was a young Black man hanged in Little Rock (Pulaski County) on November 26, 1884, for the brutal stabbing death of a young farmhand at a saloon in Argenta, now North Little Rock (Pulaski County). Frank Casey, a twenty-two-year-old, five-foot-ten-inch Black man who worked as a farm and railroad laborer, lived in Jacksonville (Pulaski County) with his mother, two brothers, and stepfather Stanford Willis. Casey was reportedly “inclined to be wild and daring.” He was drinking and dancing at an Argenta saloon when three white farmhands entered the bar shortly before midnight on October 8, 1884. Among them was twenty-two-year-old Charles Watson, a West Virginia native who had moved to Arkansas in July. Casey and Watson got into …

Causby, Robert Albert (Execution of)

Robert Albert Causby, though senseless at the time of his execution, was hanged at Batesville (Independence County) on November 25, 1904, for murdering the county sheriff. Robert Causby was born in Independence County on October 14, 1883, the son of Hepsey Catherine Causby, and grew up in Union Township near the Izard County line. His criminal career began when he was a teenager and stole an axe from the township’s constable, who fled the area after reporting that Causby had shot at him. He was jailed in Fulton County for the December 1900 robbery of a post office but escaped in February 1901 after striking a jailer with a log. Causby ran off to the Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma) and …

Chambers, Abe (Execution of)

Abe Chambers was hanged at Newport (Jackson County) on January 21, 1887, for the murder of a young African American man, a crime he denied having committed. Abe Chambers, “a negro of herculean frame,” came to Newport in late October 1886 as part of a traveling circus troupe; different accounts say that eighteen-year-old Jonas Williams either also came with the circus or that he lived in Jackson County, though he does not appear in the 1880 census there. The two men were constant companions for several days before leaving Newport. Again, accounts of what happened differ, with the Arkansas Gazette reporting that the town marshal was notified of a young man in distress in the White River bottoms and found …

Conner, Laura Cornelius

Laura Nancy Cornelius Conner was a prison reformer, educator, and farmer. In the 1920s, she served on the penitentiary board during the governorship of Thomas McRae. Conner was shocked by the conditions in the Arkansas prisons, but despite support from prisoners, community leaders, and legal experts, she was unable to make progress in reforming the penitentiary. She returned to her hometown, where she was an educator and planter until her death. Laura Cornelius was born on October 24, 1864 in Augusta (Woodruff County). She was one of eight children born to William Cornelius and Arabella White Cornelius. Arabella Cornelius died when Laura was three. After the death of her father in 1876, Laura moved in with her sister Ella and …

Corrothers, Helen Gladys Curl

Helen G. Corrothers is a well-respected figure in the world of criminal justice who was appointed by President Ronald Reagan to serve on the United States Parole Board and then the United States Sentencing Commission in the 1980s. Helen Gladys Curl was born on March 19, 1937, in Montrose (Ashley County) to Thomas Curl and Christene Farley Curl. Her father died when she was two. Following high school, Corrothers earned an Associate of Arts degree in liberal arts from Arkansas Baptist College in Little Rock (Pulaski County). She then entered the U.S. Army, serving from 1956 to 1969. She earned the rank of captain. Over the course of her army career in the Far East, Europe, and the United States, …

County Coroner, Office of the

Coroners originated in England during the twelfth century—initially being called “crowners” due to their service to the king. As the English set their sights on the land that is now the United States, the office of the coroner was one of the ideas that set sail with them. With his appointment on January 29, 1637, Thomas Baldridge of Maryland became the inaugural coroner of England’s venture into the continent. Since Baldridge’s service, the office of the coroner has evolved, yet it has maintained an important place as a medicolegal facet in death investigation in the modern United States. By 2018, twenty-seven states operated under some sort of county coroner system, while seven states were operating under a county medical examiner …

County Judge, Office of

Each county in Arkansas has a county judge, who is the chief executive officer of the county, as well as several other countywide office holders including a quorum court (legislative body) made up of justices of the peace elected from single-member districts. The county judge is custodian of county property and public buildings. Counties are essentially subdivisions of the state government. The Arkansas General Assembly controls them to the extent it desires, except as forbidden by state constitutional law. According to the Arkansas Supreme Court, a county is a political subdivision of the state established for a more convenient administration of justice and for purposes of providing services for the state. The highest county executive office is that of county judge. …

Crawford County Executions of 1843

Two enslaved African American men named Frank and Dennis were hanged at Van Buren (Crawford County) on December 22, 1843, after being convicted of raping a white woman. The Arkansas Intelligencer newspaper reported that a grand jury convened in Van Buren on May 15, 1843, and indicted two men “for committing a rape on the person of Mrs. Susan Rose.” One of them, named Frank, was tried the next day, and the Intelligencer reported “the jury retired, and in a few minutes returned a verdict of guilty.” The other man, Dennis, was tried the next day and likewise found guilty, with the newspaper reporting “the evidence was the same in each case, and not one particle of evidence was in …

Criminal Justice Institute

The Criminal Justice Institute (CJI) is a nonprofit educational entity that provides programs and services designed to enhance the proficiency of Arkansas law enforcement professionals. As a division of the University of Arkansas System, the CJI delivers advanced education and training across the state in progressive areas of criminal justice, including law enforcement management, forensic sciences, computer applications, traffic safety, school safety, and drug issues. The Criminal Justice Institute was founded in 1988 on the University of Arkansas at Little Rock (UALR) campus to address the management education and training needs of Arkansas law enforcement. Act 1111 of 1993 designated the institute as coordinator and manager of all supervisory, managerial, and executive education and training for Arkansas law enforcement. The …

Crittenden County Executions of 1871

John Roseborough and Henry Harris, both African American men convicted of murder, were hanged at Marion (Crittenden County) on June 9, 1871; before the execution, they attempted to keep from going to the gallows by barricading themselves in a cell. No accounts appear to exist of their trials, but Roseborough was convicted of killing “old man” William Freeman, while Harris was sentenced to death for the murder of John B. Crockett. Both were to be executed on June 9, 1871. A Memphis, Tennessee, newspaper reported the day before the scheduled execution that the Crittenden County sheriff “has been selecting a guard of white men to surround the scaffold during the executions because he feared a rescue by the negroes, ten …

Crumpton, Boudinot (Execution of)

aka: Bood Burris (Execution of)
Boudinot Crumpton, twenty-two, sometimes known as Bood Burris, was hanged on June 30, 1891, in Fort Smith (Sebastian County) for a murder he denied having committed. Boudinot Crumpton, who was a Cherokee man, and his companion Samson Monroe Morgan, a twenty-six-year-old native of Georgia, set out from Morgan’s residence in the Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma) on the morning of Sunday, November 3, 1889, riding a pair of Morgan’s horses. Crumpton returned later that day riding one horse and leading the other and “having in possession Morgan’s overcoat, gun and pistol.” Crumpton explained that they had encountered a man in a buggy who had offered Morgan a job herding horses in the Pawnee Nation, and so he had returned alone. Around …

Cummins Prison Break of 1940

The Cummins prison break on the morning of September 2, 1940, which was Labor Day, involved the escape of thirty-six white men from Cummins Unit (often referred to as Cummins prison farm), the largest of the three prison units in the state. The escape is the largest in Arkansas history. All the men were ultimately captured or killed by authorities. Four of the escapees were executed in Louisiana in 1941 for the murder of a deputy the day after they broke out of Cummins; these men claimed they escaped because of the horrible conditions at the prison farm. Despite an investigation into conditions at the prison, no serious attempt at reform was initiated. The 1940 escape was the first major …

Cummins Prison Strike of 1974

The Cummins prison strike of 1974 was a non-violent incident involving 200 inmates who stopped work for twenty minutes on Monday, October 14, to protest conditions at the Cummins prison farm. At 1,350 inmates at that time, Cummins—located five miles southeast of Grady (Lincoln County)—was the largest of the Arkansas prison farms. The strike was swiftly stopped by Cummins superintendent Art Lockhart, who used riot guards to ensure that prisoners returned quickly to work without any violence. By Tuesday, Cummins had returned to normal. The strike revealed that inmates could peacefully protest at that time without fear of severe physical punishment. It also showed that unrest still existed, and the prisons had more work to do before they achieved compliance …

Cummins Unit

aka: Cummins Prison Farm
Cummins Unit is a 16,600-acre maximum-security prison located five miles southeast of Grady (Lincoln County). Cummins is run by the Arkansas Department of Correction and houses male and female inmates. It is also the location of Arkansas’s facilities for administering the death penalty. Cummins is the oldest and largest of the state’s working “prison farms,” which use inmate labor to grow crops and produce livestock. In 1897, the Arkansas General Assembly established that the state could purchase “any lands, buildings, machinery, livestock and tools necessary for the use, preservation, and operation of the penitentiary.” In 1902, the state bought 10,000 acres of property—consisting of land from the Cummins and Maple Grove plantations—to create the Cummins prison farm. Cummins would later gain …