VAN BUREN -- Tony Ray returned to Crawford County for a hearing this week, 17 years after he was convicted in the shotgun slaying of a Van Buren woman.
Ray appeared Wednesday at a hearing in Crawford County Circuit Court where Judge Gary Cottrell gave Arkansas Public Defender Commission Executive Director Gregg Parrish two weeks to appoint an attorney to represent Ray in his resentencing trial. The resentencing trial will be in January or February, according to court records.
In June, Lincoln County Circuit Judge Jodi Raines Dennis vacated Ray's sentence and those of 56 others who were minors when they were sentenced to life without parole.
Ray was 16 when Lisa Gail Lewis was killed in her Van Buren home June 24, 1997. He was 18 when he was convicted Sept. 20, 1999, of her murder. He is being housed at Varner Supermax prison in Gould, according to court records.
Dennis' ruling was based on a U.S. Supreme Court decision in a 2012 case, Miller v. Alabama. Ray contended in a petition for habeas corpus that his sentence violated his Eighth Amendment right against being subjected to cruel and unusual punishment.
Crawford County Prosecuting Attorney Marc McCune said Friday that a jury deciding Ray's case will be given the option to sentence him to 10 to 40 years or life.
The penalty for capital murder is death or life without parole. McCune said the Arkansas Legislature changed the penalty for capital murder to add the term of years in cases involving youthful offenders.
Even though Ray's conviction stands, a jury will have to hear the evidence that was presented in the 1999 trial to decide his sentence. McCune said witnesses who still are alive or available will be called to testify and evidence retained over the years will be presented. In cases where witnesses are not available, he said, the transcripts of their testimony will be read to jurors.
McCune said he pulled the old case file from storage and will begin reviewing evidence. He said he thought it would take Ray's attorney at least six months to prepare for trial.
Ray and Michael Hinkston, who was 20 in 1997, were accused of breaking into Lewis' home, waiting all afternoon for her to return and then shooting her to death with a shotgun. She was shot in the neck, right hand and stomach.
In a statement he gave police after his arrest, Ray said he shot Lewis once with one shotgun, which then jammed. He used another shotgun to fire two more times at Lewis, reloading after each shot, as she pleaded for her life and recited the Lord's Prayer.
State Desk on 08/13/2016