A Craighead County attorney accused of threatening to kill two federal judges was arraigned Thursday on an indictment charging him with threatening a member of the federal judiciary.
Donald Ryan Mullenix, 35, of Jonesboro, was charged by criminal complaint last November with issuing threats against Chief U.S. District Judge D. Price Marshall Jr. and U.S. District Judge Brian Miller and was ordered to undergo a psychiatric evaluation by U.S. Magistrate Judge Joe Volpe on Nov. 9, 2022, after an initial appearance on the charges.
The next month, a federal grand jury in Little Rock indicted Mullenix on two counts of threatening members of the federal judiciary, for which he could be sentenced to 10 years in prison on each count if he is convicted.
Mullenix was accused of sending threatening emails to various people at the state and federal levels beginning in April 2022 and continuing until early the following November.
In April 2018, the complaint said, he sent an email to Miller -- the presiding judge in a civil case filed by Mullenix -- ostensibly complaining about his attorney. In the email, he told the judge to "die in a fire."
In a September email, the complaint said, Mullenix sent an email to Miller accusing another attorney of sending certified mail to his parents' Jonesboro home, saying he no longer lived there. In that email, which also mentioned Marshall, he wrote that "I keep telling them to f**k off and die in a fire like you should do..."
In an October email to Miller, the complaint said, Mullenix wrote, "If you dismiss my case without appointing me an attorney, you'll f-----g pay the way opposing counsel will. With their life."
Mullenix appeared Thursday via conference call from the Tallahatchie County jail in Tutwiler, Miss. His attorney, Chris Baker of Little Rock, was present in the courtroom. The government was represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Bryan Achorn, a prosecutor with the Western District of Arkansas, who appeared via conference call. The U.S. attorney's office for the Eastern District of Arkansas has recused from the case.
On Thursday morning, Volpe, referencing a forensic evaluation filed in February, asked Baker for his thoughts regarding Mullenix's competence to proceed with the arraignment.
"I do not currently have any belief that Mr. Mullenix is not, at this present time, competent to proceed," Baker said. "I do have questions about the order, as the order mentions current time, but also the time in the past. Our reading of competency should only pertain to the present ... We do not object that Mr. Mullenix is currently competent."
Achorn said that although Mullenix's competence at other times relative to the charged conduct could become an issue, he agreed that for purposes of the arraignment, he was competent to move forward.
Volpe then ruled that the arraignment could proceed on the basis of Mullenix's current competence.
"If you have any further issues related to his competency at the time of the offense," he said, "that will be raised with the trial judge."
The case is currently assigned to U.S. District Judge James M. Moody Jr.
According to court records, Mullenix filed a lawsuit against the Jonesboro Police Department on Nov. 3, 2021 alleging that police there violated his civil rights when they responded to a call of a welfare check at his Jonesboro home three years earlier on Nov. 7, 2018. In his complaint, Mullenix alleged that officers responding to the call had engaged in criminal behavior after turning off their bodycams and had escalated the situation to the point where Mullenix alleged that he feared he would be injured or killed.
That case was first assigned to U.S. District Judge Lee Rudofsky, who recused himself in April 2022, at which time it was reassigned to Miller, according to the court docket. Information contained in the criminal complaint against Mullenix indicated that Marshall had also recused because of a long-term association with Mullenix, who had worked with Marshall on two books.
In May 2022, Miller granted a motion by the Sutter & Gillham law firm in Little Rock to be removed from the case as Mullenix's representation and in October 2022, granted a motion to dismiss the case by attorneys for the Jonesboro Police Department alleging that Mullenix had refused to comply with discovery in the case.
The criminal complaint filed against Mullenix alleged that on Nov. 14, 2018, he was charged with assaulting a police officer and terroristic threatening in connection with the welfare check a week earlier and that he turned himself in to police on Nov. 28, 2018. According to Jonesboro District Court records, those charges were dismissed in August 2020.
Baker entered a plea of innocent to the charges against his client and asked to proceed to trial. Volpe said a jury trial is currently scheduled for June 20 in Moody's court. He said the government has estimated it will need two to three days to put on its case. Achorn asked that Mullenix be held without bail pending trial.
"We take the opposite position," Baker said. "We think our client is entitled to bail under the Bail Reform Act."
Baker initially requested a hearing to be set for Monday but it quickly became evident that scheduling conflicts between the U.S. Marshals Service, the attorneys and Volpe's court and a lack of other magistrate judges in the district as a result of recusal would create difficulties in setting a hearing.
"I was under the impression that all other magistrate judges are recused in this case," Achorn said. "I may be incorrect but that was my understanding."
Baker said in order to facilitate the hearing his office would be willing to "work or amend whatever we need necessary to work with the court."
"I appreciate that," Volpe said. "This case presents some additional complications because of the recusal issues."