TRI-LAKES AREA — Two county courthouses in the Tri-Lakes region are looking to increase security following a shooting incident in the Crawford County Courthouse in Van Buren in September, when a court judge’s secretary was shot and wounded.
The gunman, identified as James Ray Palmer, 48, fired many times while inside the courthouse and outside the building, after he was told Judge Gary Cottrell was not there. Palmer was shot by police and died two hours later.
Saline County Judge Lanny Fite said some of the plans for tightening security at the Saline County Courthouse in Benton have been under way for more than a year. However, other measures under consideration for the protection of the Quorum Court and county employees were proposed following the Crawford County Courthouse shooting.
“Here, it is the extra manpower that we have been talking about after the shooting,” Fite said. “The bailiffs keep the courtrooms safe from intruders, but the rest of the building is not secure.”
For the Saline County Courthouse, the first move would be to close and lock three of the five doors that allow access to the courthouse. Fite said the plan would be to have metal detectors and armed security personnel at the two doors that would still allow the public to enter the building.
“The guards would have a side arm and a Taser,” Fite said.
The security personnel to secure the building would cost around $180,000, Fiser said. He said the Saline County Quorum Court will meet Nov. 7 to hear a report on whether the county can afford the plan.
“We have a meeting of the Finance Committee scheduled that night, and we will hear about the anticipated revenue that should be coming in,” Fite said. “Then we can look at the request.”
Funding for the metal detectors has come to the county from grants. Some of the money is federal funds from Homeland Security,Fite said, but the majority of the money is from a grant from the Court Security and Emergency Preparedness Fund controlled by the administrative office of the Arkansas Supreme Court, whose security staff has been meeting with county officials around the state to talk about courthouse security.
In Malvern, Hot Spring County Judge Bill Scrimshire said new metal detectors in the lobby of the second floor of the Hot Spring County Courthouse would screen people attending county circuit court. Scrimshire said the detectors will be turned on during high-profile cases.
The metal detectors that have been in the circuit court are being moved to the 7th Judicial District Court facilities on Third Street in Malvern, Scrimshire said. In addition, a new door into the offices of District Court Judge Chris Williams is being planned.
“The door will have a lock that will be released from the clerk’s desk,” Scrimshire said. “That way, people cannot just walk in there.”
Fite said he has looked around the county offices in Benton with extra security and exit routes in mind.
“We have a lot of offices with no back door,” Fite said. “If someone were to come in as a threat, there would be no escape route.”
In Hot Spring County, a video camera will be installed in the courthouse to monitor and create a record of those processed through the metal detectors.
The $100,000 price of the equipment to be used in Hot Spring County is provided by a grant from the same Supreme Court security court fund that paid for equipment in Saline County. Scrimshire said Hot Spring County has been working on adding the equipment for almost two years.
In addition, some of the doors in the courthouse in Malvern will be altered.
“We will have panic bars put on the doors so you can go out, but you can’t come in,” Scrimshire said. “Those will be on the back doors of the courthouse.”
The judge said four of the doors of the county courthouse will have no enhanced security measures.
“We don’t want to get where people can’t get into the county’s building,” Scrimshire said. “We don’t want people to feel shut out.”
Fite said he feels secure in his office in the Saline County Courthouse in Benton.
“I’ve been threatened before in this office, but I feel safe,” he said, “but I am not involved in people’s divorces or custody hearings like the court judges are.”
However, as Elaine Stanfield, administrative assistant for the Crawford County judge, said the day of the shooting in Van Buren, “This has changed our lives.”
Staff writer Wayne Bryan can be reached at (501) 244-4460 or wbryan@arkansasonline.com.
Tri-Lakes, Pages 185 on 10/30/2011