CONWAY -- Former state Sen. Gilbert Baker has objected to a request that he explain any communications he has had with former Judge Michael Maggio about a series of topics, including a lawsuit that resulted from a nursing-home patient's death and that led to a criminal investigation of contributions to Maggio's unsuccessful appeals court campaign.
Baker's response is among a series of objections in a document filed in Faulkner County Circuit Court on Monday. The filing, which appeared online Tuesday, came in lawsuit proceedings against Baker, Maggio and nursing-home owner Michael Morton of Fort Smith. Such objections are not uncommon in the early stage of a lawsuit.
Morton has stated under oath that he mailed thousands of dollars in checks to Baker's Conway home as contributions to eight political action committees and that he thought the money would eventually go to Maggio's since-halted campaign for the Arkansas Court of Appeals. All but one of the PACs, funded almost exclusively by Morton, later donated to Maggio's campaign. Baker helped raise money for Maggio's campaign but has denied that the PACs were solely for Maggio.
The FBI is investigating Morton's PAC contributions, made in the form of checks dated July 8, 2013. The same day, Maggio heard arguments on whether to reduce a Faulkner County jury's $5.2 million judgment against the Morton-owned nursing home in Greenbrier where patient Martha Bull, 76, died in 2008.
On July 10, 2013, Maggio cut the negligence-lawsuit judgment to $1 million.
In a document filed in Faulkner County Circuit Court on Monday and listed online Tuesday, Baker's attorney, Richard Watts, objected to numerous requests from attorneys for Bull's family.
In one, for example, the plaintiffs had asked for any communications Baker has had with Maggio about various matters: the Bull case; Morton; donations to Maggio's campaign; "tort reform," or legislation to overhaul measures regulating lawsuits; judicial reduction of jury verdicts; and the political action committees at issue.
Watts responded: "Such inquiry is overly broad and ambiguous. As phrased, it could literally call for identification of any passing comment made by or to Michael Maggio with respect to the subjects listed." Watts said the question was "unduly burdensome."
Maggio withdrew from the appeals court race last year after contentious comments he made online about women, sex, race and a legally confidential adoption case that became public.
The Arkansas Supreme Court ordered Maggio removed from office Sept. 11, months after it had stripped him of all cases and after allegations about the contributions surfaced. The court acted after the Arkansas Judicial and Disability Commission recommended that Maggio not hear any further cases because of the online postings.
State Desk on 01/07/2015