A Batesville man admitted Thursday to a federal judge that one day last summer he was so eager to destroy evidence that could put him in jail that he burned down a state office.
As a result, he has been locked up for 13 months and is facing a five-year minimum stay in a federal prison.
When he gets out, he faces three years of probation and a mandatory restitution order of $157,717.76 to the insurance company for the costs of rebuilding the office.
With a shrug of his shoulders, 51-year-old Douglas McArthur Adams III stood in front of U.S. District Judge Susan Webber Wright on Thursday afternoon and admitted breaking the glass backdoor of a Batesville probation office about 2 a.m. June 10, 2013, splashing gasoline inside and then igniting it.
Three days earlier, probation officers had collected a methamphetamine-positive urine sample from him.
His plan, he acknowledged Thursday, was to destroy the urine sample that threatened to revoke his pretrial probation, on which he had been permitted to remain free until he could be tried on a methamphetamine charge.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Gordon said a prosecutor in Independence County has promised to dismiss the methamphetamine charge in return for Adams' agreement to plead guilty to a federal arson charge.
The arson charge, to which Adams pleaded guilty in Wright's Little Rock courtroom, carries a mandatory minimum sentence of five years under federal statutes. It also carries a maximum sentence of 20 years and a fine of up to $250,000, along with the mandatory restitution and three years of supervised release after his stint in federal prison, where parole is not available.
The probation office where the fire occurred is rented by the Arkansas Department of Community Correction and is located in a strip mall at 913 25th St. in Batesville.
The building wasn't destroyed, Gordon said, but Union Standard Insurance Co. of Irving, Texas, had to pay more than $157,000 to repair the damage.
The Batesville Fire Department was summoned to the blaze by Batesville police, who responded to a motion detector alarm in the office.
Adams' legal troubles began July 20, 2012, when he was arrested by Independence County sheriff's deputies on a charge of violating a protection order and possession of a controlled substance (methamphetamine), according to a written synopsis of his case that was filed Friday along with his plea agreement.
Adams was released on a $15,000 bond July 31, 2012, under conditions that required him to submit to periodic drug testing by probation officers, according to the document.
When he reported to the probation office June 6, 2013, for drug testing, his urine sample tested "presumptively positive" for methamphetamine, and a probation officer told him about the results. The officer then placed the findings in a binder in the office, and the urine sample was placed in the office's refrigerator for further testing.
After the fire, which the alarm detected at 1:55 a.m. June 10, 2013, the sheriff's office requested the investigative assistance of the Arkansas State Police and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Preliminary reports from the investigation showed that the fire started in the room adjacent to the refrigerator where drug-testing urine samples were stored and that the only item missing from the office was the binder in which results of drug tests were stored, according to the document.
It said investigators determined that the glass in the office's rear door had been broken with one of several sandstone rocks in the area, and they also found a drop of dried blood on the door.
State police investigators obtained surveillance video from a nearby storage business that showed a white Ford F-150 pickup with a nonworking brake light in the rear window driving slowly past the probation office at 1:54 a.m.
On June 11, 2013, according to the document, an Independence County circuit judge issued an arrest warrant for Adams after revoking his bond based on the positive drug screen. Later that day, it says, a detective with the sheriff's office watched Adams leave his home in a white Ford pickup and followed him to a local store, where he was arrested.
While conducting an inventory search of the truck, officers found a pair of gloves on which pieces of sandstone rock -- like those outside the probation office -- were stuck, according to the document. It said officers also found a piece of glass on the driver's side floorboard, and they noted that a brake light in the truck's back window didn't work.
The dried blood was tested at the state Crime Laboratory, where technicians obtained a DNA profile that matched one obtained from Adams under a federal search warrant, according to the document.
Wright accepted Adams' guilty plea Thursday but said she won't set a sentencing date until after a pre-sentencing report is prepared, which will take at least 45 days.
Previous brushes with the law likely will affect whatever penalty range is recommended under federal sentencing guidelines, which recommend a range within the statutory framework.
No mention was made of any prior convictions in Thursday's hearing, in which Adams was represented by attorney Molly Sullivan of the federal public defender's office.
Metro on 06/27/2014