Five men, including two police officers, face 14 counts of theft on accusations that they stole more than $130,000 worth of soybeans and corn from a Woodruff County grain-processing facility.
Arrested were part-time Augusta police officer Sylvester "Pug" Hall of Pumpkin Bend; Booker Pennington, a full-time McCrory police officer; and Michael Smith, Ricky Dale Blunt, and Charles Johns, all of McCrory.
Each faces 14 counts of theft of property, a Class C felony punishable by three to 10 years in prison and a fine of up to $10,000, Prosecuting Attorney Fletcher Long Jr. said in a statement about the arrests.
Long said the amount stolen exceeded $134,000.
Long said the five stole soybeans and corn from Morris Granary of McCrory between December 2014 and January 2015 and sold it to a Helena-West Helena facility.
Hall owned a grain trucking business, and Pennington drove a truck part time for Hall's business, Long said.
Woodruff County Sheriff Phil Reynolds said the other suspects worked at Morris Granary and notified Hall and Pennington when they could load soybeans and corn.
"They had a system going," Reynolds said. "They would know when they could slip the trucks in and get the grains."
Long said in the statement that Smith would "provide fake documentation to make it appear as if the loadouts were proper." The others "would participate in loading the trucks and making certain the management was kept in the dark about the thefts."
Reynolds said workers at Morris Granary noticed the theft of the corn and soybeans during a recent inventory.
"They kept coming up short," he said. "It was a lot."
Augusta Police Chief Eric Morgan and McCrory Police Chief Paul Hatch did not return telephone calls Thursday afternoon.
Long said in the statement that Pennington would deliver the soybeans and corn to the grain facility in Helena-West Helena and say it was from T&H Farms, which was a business owned by Hall. Hall would later pick up payments made to his farm, deposit them in a bank account and then pay the others, Long said.
The Arkansas State Police is assisting Long in the investigation, as is the Woodruff County sheriff's office and the McCrory Police Department.
Reynolds said he expects more arrests will be made as the investigation continues, and he said the amount of product stolen should be much higher.
"Grain is the easiest thing to steal," the sheriff said. "There are no serial numbers on grain, and there's no way to track it."
State Desk on 09/18/2015