Two days after losing his re-election bid, state Rep. T. Wes Wagner was being sued by a former high school classmate who wants a judge to force the Mississippi County Democrat to pay back everything he's earned since 2013 as a state representative and as the Manila city attorney.
Wagner, whose parents represented the region in the Legislature before him, was appointed Manila city attorney in 2011, then elected to the state House of Representatives in 2012.
But the Arkansas Constitution forbids legislators from being appointed or elected to any civil office, which makes all of his earnings from those jobs illegal, according to the lawsuit filed Thursday by Chris Gamble, a Manila furniture store owner.
Doyle Webb, chairman of the state Republican Party, has filed a similar lawsuit against state Rep. Nate Steel for working as the Nashville city attorney while serving in the General Assembly. Steel, a Democrat, lost the attorney general's race to Republican Leslie Rutledge in Tuesday's elections. Steel has yet to respond to the suit.
Both lawsuits cite Article 5, Section 10 of the state constitution, which states "no senator or representative shall, during the term for which he shall have been elected, be appointed or elected to any civil office under this state."
Represented by Little Rock attorney Christopher Brockett, Gamble wants Pulaski County Circuit Judge Wendell Griffen to stop Wagner from collecting any further pay from the positions; order an accounting of what Wagner has already earned in pay, expenses and benefits; and then force Wagner to repay it.
Wagner did not return a phone message Thursday evening.
Wagner, a lawyer since 2006, was defeated Tuesday while seeking a second term, losing to Leachville Republican Dave Wallace, who won with 4,126 votes to Wagner's 3,219, with all 13 precincts reporting, according to unofficial figures from the secretary of state's office.
Gamble's lawsuit comes two months after the Arkansas Court of Appeals ruled against him in another suit against Wagner -- an attempt to force Wagner to repay Gamble for an $8,150 electric advertising sign that Gamble had lent Wagner in 2010 in his first attempt to run for the Legislature. The sign was somehow damaged beyond repair.
The appeals court ruling in September, representing almost three years of litigation, was that Gamble had no evidence that Wagner was responsible for the damage.
Thursday's lawsuit is not the first one between the two men in Pulaski County Circuit Court. Two years ago, Gamble sued to keep Wagner from taking office, arguing that Wagner was misrepresenting his residency to run for the legislative seat then held by his mother, Charolette Wagner.
Wes Wagner won that seat, running unopposed, and took office in January 2013.
Gamble argued that Wagner really lived in Jonesboro, but the judge, after a nine-hour hearing, ruled that Wagner had lived in Manila for the required year before the election and dismissed Gamble's suit.
Wagner testified at the August 2012 hearing that in 2010, after losing a bid to represent Jonesboro in the state House, he moved to Manila to run for his mother's House seat because she was term-limited after first being elected in 2006.
Wagner's father, Wayne Wagner, is the mayor of Manila. The senior Wagner was a state representative for the area from 1987 to 1998.
To qualify as a legislative candidate from Manila, Wes Wagner told the judge, he had moved out of his Jonesboro home in January 2011 -- a month before the birth of his daughter.
His wife, Katy Wagner, a dentist who co-owns her practice, testified at the time that the couple lived separately but had regular visits, even after the baby was born. Property records show the couple sold their Lochmoor Circle home in Jonesboro earlier this year.
A key source of contention in that suit was where Wagner was living when he ran for office -- a building behind his parents' home on Arkansas 77 North where he lived rent-free. The building has at least three physical addresses in official records, and demonstrating its exact location in court required the testimony of the Manila police chief and the city water superintendent.
Metro on 11/07/2014