The bribery trial of former state senator Gilbert Baker, which was ordered postponed until Monday after one of the trial attorneys fell ill Wednesday night, was postponed a second time after the attorney tested positive for the covid-19 virus.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Patrick Harris notified court officials late Wednesday night that he had fallen ill and was scheduled for a rapid covid test on Thursday. That test returned negative and was reported to Chief U.S. District Judge D. Price Marshall Jr. later that day. Marshall ordered court recessed on Friday to allow Assistant U.S. Attorney John Ray White -- who was called in to work with Assistant U.S. Attorney Julie Peters in Harris' absence -- time to get up to speed on the case.
But over the weekend a more accurate polymerase chain reaction test for covid-19 returned positive for the virus, prompting Marshall to issue a written order requiring all trial participants to obtain a PCR test and report the results back to him "as soon as practicable" to enable him to make a decision whether to resume the trial this week.
A subsequent order entered Monday indicated that court will resume this morning.
"PCR test results for trial participants continue to come in," read the order. "So far, everyone has tested negative. The Court will reconvene at 8:15 a.m. on Tuesday, 3 August 2021. We will have a more complete picture by then, and, with counsel's help, the Court will decide how we will proceed. All jurors should report by 8:15 a.m. on Tuesday."
Assistant U.S. Attorney Allison Bragg, spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney's office in Little Rock, confirmed that Harris was the attorney referenced in Marshall's order and said he is resting comfortably at home.
The order said that all jurors, lawyers, the defendant, case agents, paralegals and witnesses will be reimbursed by the Library Fund of the Eastern District of Arkansas for any expense incurred by this or any future testing that may be necessitated by the trial.
The trial had already lost a juror who tested positive for covid-19 the weekend after jury selection and was dismissed on Aug. 26. At that time, the remaining 11 jurors and three alternates agreed to keep going so the juror was replaced with an alternate and the trial resumed.
Baker is accused of bribing former 20th Judicial District circuit court Judge Mike Maggio to cut a $5.2 million award in a 2013 nursing home case -- which Maggio did a day after $30,000 in campaign donations was delivered to Baker's Conway home in the form of 10 $3,000 checks made out to 10 different political action committees Baker is alleged to have controlled -- in exchange for campaign contributions to Maggio's Court of Appeals campaign. A FedEx package bearing those checks, along with others sent by nursing home owner Michael Morton for a total of $228,000, arrived at Baker's home on July 9, 2013. On July 10, 2013, Maggio cut the jury's award to $1 million.
On July 8, 2013, attorneys for Greenbrier Nursing and Rehabilitation Center filed motions on behalf of the center attempting to get the award reduced or reversed.
By Thursday, the jury of eight women and four men had heard from about a dozen witnesses, including Maggio, Morton, Arkansas Supreme Court Justice Rhonda Wood, three officers from political action committees formed by Baker who testified to being unaware until later they had been named as officers, the attorney who set up the PACs and others who testified to their involvement with Baker.
Wood testified that she had received $48,000 in contributions for her Arkansas Supreme Court race from Morton that came through Baker but said she became suspicious when she saw the dates on the checks had been altered.
Maggio, whose version of events has changed at times, continued in that vein during his testimony, rambling and at various times seeming to alternately implicate Baker or exonerate him while alternately implicating and exonerating himself.
Morton reiterated his earlier assertions that the contributions were coincidental and that he has committed no wrongdoing.
Chris Stewart, a Little Rock attorney active in Arkansas politics, testified to the creation of eight political action committees Baker hired him to set up, saying those PACs were formed solely for the purpose of funneling money to Maggio's campaign. He said that when publicity began mounting after Maggio's reduction of the nursing home award, he gathered up his documents and went to the FBI after being granted immunity for his information and testimony.
At the conclusion of Thursday's testimony, Peters said she expects to call as many as 10 more witnesses, including Tom Courtway, former president of the University of Central Arkansas, for whom Baker worked at the time he was indicted.
Hendrix told Marshall that possible defense witnesses include former statehouse candidate Stacy Hurst, Maggio's wife Dawn, Republican party political operative Clint Reed, former U.S. Attorney Cody Hiland, state Sen. President Pro-Tempore Jimmy Hickey, and others.