A letter from Pulaski County Prosecuting Attorney Larry Jegley to the Arkansas Supreme Court calls the county’s drug court a “catastrophe” and objects to a plan that would allow its current judge, Mary McGowan, to keep any existing cases.
The state’s highest court is considering a plan by circuit judges that would send new drug court cases to Circuit Judge Patti James but allow McGowan to continue hearing cases she has already begun.
In the letter Jegley sent Thursday, the prosecutor says McGowan bullies defendants and lawyers in her court. His letter also cites a 2014 study that says her program has a high rate of repeat offenders.
“I cannot in good conscience, or as an officer of the courts, participate in what I know is a program of manifest problems,” Jegley’s letter to the seven Supreme Court justices says. He also says his office doesn’t have the resources to staff drug courts in two separate courtrooms.
Read Friday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for full details.