HOT SPRINGS -- Samuel Conway, 27, on Wednesday will face the first of two capital murder trials in Garland County.
The trial this week involves the 2005 shooting death of Mary Adams. The second trial, currently set for April 14, stems from the 2009 slayings of four members of the Gentry family and a young woman. Their bound bodies were found by firefighters battling a blaze on the Gentrys' secluded property in Pearcy.
On Monday, defense attorneys asked 18th East Judicial Circuit Judge John Homer Wright to suppress Conway's statement to police about his alleged involvement in Adams' slaying.
The problem, public defender Scott Brisendine said, is that two former Hot Springs police detectives have been unable to produce a standard police form showing that Conway was read his Miranda rights before being interrogated Dec. 13, 2005. In other words, there is no evidence that Conway waived his right to remain silent or his right to an attorney before police questioned him.
The police have also been unable to produce Conway's original statement. The one in his case file is a photocopy. There is no audio or video of the interview. Both of the former detectives testified Monday that they routinely threw away any handwritten notes taken during interrogations.
Former Detective Jerry Cotton, now retired from the Hot Springs Police Department, told the court that he remembers going over a Miranda form with Conway.
Sgt. Tim Smith, who now works in patrol, said he also recollects Conway signing the form before the interview.
Neither Cotton nor Smith could explain what happened to the form.
Smith said he took notes during the interview with Conway. He then typed up a statement, which Conway read and approved before signing, Smith testified. The first paragraph of the statement notes that Conway was read his rights and that he willingly talked to police.
After the interview, Smith trashed his notes.
"It's just kind of my policy," Smith said. "I don't need them anymore."
Like Cotton, Smith also was unable to say what happened to the original statement.
"So there's a lot of important paperwork that's gone missing?" Brisendine asked.
"It appears so," Smith replied.
At the time of the police interview, Conway was incarcerated at the Garland County jail on another, unrelated charge. Neither of the former detectives could remember what that charge was.
If convicted of capital murder, aggravated robbery and residential burglary in Adams' killing, Conway faces life without parole. Prosecutors have waived the death penalty.
Adams' slaying
On March 14, 2005, Eric Adams arrived at his Hot Springs home to discover the body of his mother, Mary, in the living room. His two small children also were there, unharmed.
An investigation revealed that the woman had been robbed. She was shot in the face by a small-caliber weapon, according to court documents.
On Dec. 5, 2005, Cotton and Smith interviewed a woman named Dominic Hobson. She told the detectives that she was with Conway and his older brother, Detric, on the day Mary Adams was shot.
According to court documents, Hobson told police that she went with the brothers to burglarize the house. She and Samuel Conway knocked on the door while Detric Conway hid around the corner, she said.
Hobson told police that Adams let them in, and Hobson went immediately to the bathroom. At that point, Detric Conway entered the home and shot Adams, according to her statement in the documents.
A vehicle pulled up to the house, prompting Hobson and both Conways to flee through a bedroom window, she told police. Hobson decided to walk back to her house, but the Conways told her they were going back to the Adams home to finish the robbery, the documents said.
About 15 or 20 minutes later, the two Conways arrived at Hobson's house with two or three pillowcases stuffed with items from Adams' home, she said. Those items included a Sony Playstation 2, a pair of new Reebok tennis shoes, a piggy bank and a metal lock box containing cash, Hobson said.
On Dec. 13, 2005, the detectives interviewed Samuel Conway, then 18. He corroborated Hobson's account of what happened at the Adams home, according to a probable cause affidavit submitted by police to the prosecutor.
According to the affidavit, Samuel Conway told police that Detric Conway had shot Mary Adams in front of him and her two grandchildren. After fleeing the home, he and Detric returned to steal the items described by Hobson.
Hobson, 28, pleaded guilty Sept. 29, 2011, to first-degree murder and aggravated robbery. She was sentenced to 300 months and will be eligible for parole in March 2028.
Last year, on May 20, 2013, prosecutors dropped all of the charges against Detric Conway, citing insufficient evidence.
The Gentry murders
Samuel Conway also faces additional capital-murder charges in April, when he will be retried in the killings of the Gentry family and their son's girlfriend.
In November 2009, firefighters battling a blaze at the Gentrys' secluded mobile home in Garland County discovered the charred remains of Edward Gentry Jr., 56; his wife, Pam Gentry, 52; their son, Jeremy Gentry, 24; and his girlfriend, Kristyn Warneke, 19.
Next door, they found the body of Edward E. Gentry Sr., 80, inside his ransacked house.
Samuel Conway and two other men were sought in the slayings. One of the men, Marvin Stringer, 22, died soon afterward in a shootout with police. The other, Jeremy Pickney, pleaded guilty Oct. 14, 2011, to conspiracy to commit aggravated residential burglary and theft by receiving more than $2,500. He was sentenced to 50 years in prison.
Samuel Conway was convicted in June 2011 of five counts of capital murder, two counts of aggravated residential burglary and four counts of theft of property. He was sentenced to five life terms without parole and two additional life sentences plus 90 years.
On Nov. 8, 2012, the Arkansas Supreme Court reversed Samuel Conway's convictions and ordered a new trial. In their opinion, the justices said that the lower court had erred when it twice denied defense attorneys' requests to dismiss a juror.
The motions were prompted by a note sent to the judge by one of the jurors after three days of testimony. The note read: "I don't think I can be a fair juror anymore."
Brought before the judge, the juror explained: "Basically, due to the testimony and the pictures I've been seeing, I haven't been getting any sleep. I've basically -- I know it's bad saying this -- I've basically made up my mind about it. And I've gotten to the point to where I'm sleeping with one of my shotguns loaded beside my bed 'cause of the testimony I've been hearing. That's basically -- it's bad saying it, but I've made up my mind about the case already this early."
The justices wrote: "The critical fact is that [the juror] unequivocally stated that he could not be fair and impartial and that he could not deliberate, yet he remained on the jury."
State Desk on 11/18/2014