Jeremy Hutchinson, the former legislator and admitted felon, walked out of the Pulaski County jail Tuesday night after his divorce-court judge reduced the cost of his immediate freedom from $524,000 to $10,500, an amount he was able to pay within seven hours of the decision.
Jailed since Dec. 29, Hutchinson had spent the past 19 days locked up on a judge's finding that he had deliberately shirked his financial obligations to his children and ex-wife under the couple's 2011 divorce decree, owing them $629,898, mostly in child support and unpaid college tuition. Found in contempt of court, he was ordered jailed until he paid $524,000.
It is an impossible amount that Hutchinson, the son of a former U.S. senator and nephew of an ex-governor, could never pay because he's destitute, his attorney Clint Lancaster has said since taking up the case.
To get Hutchinson released, Lancaster had unsuccessfully tried to get the Arkansas Supreme Court and federal bankruptcy court to intervene. Friday, Lancaster withdrew Hutchinson's bankruptcy application.
Lancaster had argued that ongoing incarceration was unfairly punitive because his client couldn't pay and also put the 48-year-old Hutchinson at risk for covid-19 in the jail, where administrators had put him in solitary confinement to protect him from other inmates.
He had said Hutchinson, facing a Feb. 3 sentencing on federal bribery and tax fraud charges, needed to be out of jail to prepare with his lawyers to provide mitigating evidence to the federal judge. Further, Hutchison had legal grounds for not paying because if he did pay, it would have the effect of waiving any appeal, and Hutchinson disputes he owes the amount that's been set by the court.
Tuesday, Lancaster persuaded Circuit Judge Cara Connors that Hutchinson would never be able to pay during a one-hour hearing. Connors is hearing the case as the successor to the original judge, Alice Gray, who retired from the bench at the end of the year.
Lancaster told the judge Hutchinson earned only $11,000 last year and that the most he might be able to put up would be assets valued at $5,000. That would be principally backed by his daughter's car, which is in Hutchinson's name.
Over the objections of Hutchinson's ex-wife and her lawyer, Connors agreed to shorten his jail time to 30 days with credit for the time he's already been in jail, which would put his release date at Jan. 28. If Hutchinson wanted out earlier, he could pay $10,500, his monthly child support payment, she said. Connors said she wanted to see that Hutchinson's children at least got something sooner rather than later. Her ruling does not end his obligations to his ex-wife and children.
Stephanie Hutchinson and attorney Jocelyn Stotts told the judge they're confident Jeremy Hutchinson has the means to pay what he owes, but the only way to make him live up to his obligations is to keep him in jail until he does so.
They've described him as living a luxurious lifestyle, neglecting his financial duty to his children even while collecting "substantial six-figure fees." They say he's paid only $5,730 in child support since 2019, when he promised to pay $10,500 monthly as part of his divorce.
Hutchinson, a Republican, served two terms in the state House and state Senate where his second term was cut short in August 2018 when he was indicted. A former lawyer, he surrendered his law license rather than face disbarment after pleading guilty to the federal charges.
Tuesday he attended court in a blue jail uniform with a belly chain and leg shackles but did not address the judge.
Jail records show that Hutchinson has given clearance to three visitors aside from his second wife, including Lu Hardin, the former University of Central Arkansas president who pleaded guilty in 2011 to federal money laundering and wire fraud charges for falsifying a memo to school trustees involving his $300,000 bonus; and Gilbert Baker, the former state senator who resigned in 2019 under federal indictment on bribery and wire fraud charges but was subsequently cleared. The records aren't clear as to whether the men have gone to the jail to see him.