State’s high court vacates gag order in SAU homicide case

The Donald W. Reynolds Campus and Community Center, seen here on Tuesday, Aug. 11, is across the street from a parking lot on the campus of Southern Arkansas University where a student was killed and another wounded in a shooting on the morning of Aug. 11.
The Donald W. Reynolds Campus and Community Center, seen here on Tuesday, Aug. 11, is across the street from a parking lot on the campus of Southern Arkansas University where a student was killed and another wounded in a shooting on the morning of Aug. 11.

The Arkansas Supreme Court on Friday vacated a lower court’s expansive gag order issued in the aftermath of an Aug. 11 shooting on the campus of Southern Arkansas University in Magnolia.

The Supreme Court responded to a petition submitted last month by attorneys for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette and the Arkansas Press Association asking for the review by the state’s high court.

In a phone interview on Friday evening, Alec Gaines, an attorney representing the media in the case, indicated he believed the Arkansas Supreme Court’s ruling did not indicate the court would hear oral arguments and effectively ended the matter by vacating the original and amended copies of the circuit court judge’s gag order. Gaines is married to Eliza Hussman Gaines, the managing editor of the Democrat-Gazette.

The orders on publicity were issued last month by Judge David Talley Jr. of the 13th Judicial Circuit in Southern Arkansas. The gag order barred many categories of people — including friends of the parties involved, public officials and members of the media — from discussing elements of the case, with a few exceptions.

According to the brief order, Associate Justice Courtney Rae Hudson would have dismissed the media’s petition for writ of certiorari. Associate Justice Shawn Womack would have denied the petition.

Joshua Keshun Smith, a 21-year-old student, was killed and another student was wounded in the shooting at Southern Arkansas University.

Four men, three of them Southern Arkansas University students, have been held in the Columbia County jail without bail in connection to the shooting. They face capital murder and aggravated robbery charges.

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