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Shooting in Mineral Springs

The Howard County Dispatch received a 9-1-1 call at 6:48 p.m. on Thursday, 6/18/2020 of two people shot at 415 N. Mercer St. in Mineral Springs, AR. Officers and medics responded to find a black male (Jawara Stewart of Nashville) lying in the street with a handgun near by. They also were directed to a man doing CPR on a juvenile male (16 yo) lying in a yard at a nearby residence. Officers secured the scenes as medical aid was given by Pafford EMS.

The juvenile male was transported to Howard Memorial Hospital where he was pronounced dead soon after his arrival. Stewart was transported by air to a hospital where he died also.

The investigation and witnesses indicate that Stewart and the juvenile male were outside this residence in Mineral Springs along with others when the two eventually ended up fighting over the handgun in the yard near the street. It is believed at this point that both Stewart and the male juvenile received gut shot wounds during this struggle that resulted in their death.

The bodies of both Stewart and the juvenile are being sent to the Arkansas State Crime Lab for further investigation. This investigation is ongoing at this point.

 

Sheriff, Bryan McJunkins

Self-inflicted gun shot wound


The sheriff’s office received a call at approximately 2:00 p.m. today from a duck hunter reporting finding a pickup truck at the boat ramp with a man inside who he thinks had shot himself. Units arrived and found John Greg Tate, 67 of Nashville deceased inside his truck. Mr. Tate died from an apparent, self-inflicted, single gun shot wound.

 

Bryan McJunkins, Sheriff

Howard County Officer of the Year

The 2016 Arkansas Law Enforcement Summit was held Oct 4-5. It was 2 days of speakers, and training, and at a luncheon on the 5th the Attorney General’s Office selected from each county in Arkansas a “County Officer of the Year”. From these, 6 were chosen as regional Officers of the Year and an Arkansas Officer of the Year was selected there. Deputy Todd Tallant was the officer chosen by the AG’s office as County Officer of the Year. Jana Tallant (Jail Administrator and Todd’s wife) and I accompanied Todd to the Summit luncheon for the awards ceremony. I think Deputy Tallant was a great choice for the award. He is dedicated to the sheriff’s department and the people of this county. Todd is the County’s training officer, SWAT team commander, firearms instructor, pepper gun and TASER instructor. Todd handles these additional and specialized tasked all while performing his required daily duties as a Howard County Patrol Deputy. This often requires Todd using much of his own time to monitor, prepare and conduct these specialized tasks. Todd has never failed to take care of whatever was asked of him by the department. I and the rest of Howard County’s Law Enforcement would like to congratulate Todd on being chosen for this honor.

 

Thank you.

 

 

Bryan McJunkins, Sheriff

 

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Howard County Sheriff's Office Updates Text Alert System on Website

The Howard County Sheriff’s Office will upgrade its text message alert notification feature on October 3rd to supplement an upgrade completed earlier this summer. The upgraded text alert system will feature a short URL in the message body, instead of a full URL. The messages will continue to come from 96167 or 470-219-3777. Below is an example of a current alert with a full URL and a sample of the same alert with a short URL:

As shown above, the message body will have a Subject line (the Press Release title, in the above example) and a From address of Howard Sheriff AR. There will still be an option to change subscription at the bottom of the message.

To sign up for alert notifications from our office, to change your current subscription, or to unsubscribe from our alerts, please go to our Sign Up for Alerts page. 

The Howard County Sheriff’s Office welcomes any feedback from the community on this text alert upgrade. To provide feedback, please let us know through our Contact Us form or call us at 870-845-2626.

As always, we wish to thank the public for their continued support of law enforcement. We believe the unique partnership we have between the public and law enforcement enhances the security and quality of life we all enjoy.

Sheriff Bryan McJunkins

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Howard C. Holder 47 yo of Dierks

 

 

Judge Yeargan set a $100,000.00 bond on September 23 on Holder for the offense of Rape. Investigator Jade Hughes was assigned this case after the Sheriff’s Office received information from the Crimes Against Children Hotline that a juvenile female had been sexually abused by Holder beginning as far back as three years ago, when the victim was fourteen. Investigators set up interviews with the victim and gathered information to be shared with Investigator Hughes. Investigator Hughes interviewed Holder (the suspect in this case) on September 22, when he (Holder) admitted the information reported of the sexual abuse of the juvenile did happen. Holder was placed under arrest at that time and placed in jail. Holder is set for a first appearance in court Wednesday, September 28.  

 

 

Bryan McJunkins, Sheriff

Update on the Mineral Springs Bank Robber

The investigation has been ongoing since the day of the robbery (July 25) with several agencies working on the investigation. Arkansas Special Agents John Rhone and Corwin Battle are the lead case agents for the investigation. Investigators from the Howard County Sheriff’s Office, the Nashville Police Department, the FBI, and the Mineral Springs Police Department all worked hard on the investigation. By Wednesday, August 17, arrest warrants had been obtained for four individuals and Special Agents Rhone and Battle, along with Howard County Investigator Blake Eudy, Nashville Investigator Larry Marion, and a Federal Agent went to Tulsa, Ok. and worked with Tulsa P.D. to arrest three of the four robbery suspects. Agents and investigators also executed search warrants in Tulsa to further obtain evidence in the case. The Howard County Sheriff’s Office will extradite the suspects back to Howard County to be held. Further arrests are expected and the investigation is continuing. The three suspects arrested are listed below.

 

Bobby Padillow, 24 of Tulsa

Tatyana McBee, 18 of Tulsa

Byron Colman, 30 of Tulsa

 

I will update with further information as it becomes available.

 

Thank you,

 

Bryan McJunkins, Sheriff

Death Investigation

 

Name: Leeanna Sue Brown (Martin)

Date of Birth: 01.04.1975

Race: White

Gender: Female

Address: Mc Caskill, AR.

Incident Location: Howard County Jail; Nashville, AR.

 

On the morning of July 27, 2016, a Howard County Jailor found Leeanna Brown in her jail cell with a bed sheet tied around her neck and to the window bars of the cell. The jailor ran into the cell and freed Leeanna, and called for assistance. Leeanna was unresponsive when the jailor freed her from the bed sheet. Other staff ran to the cell to assist the jailor and life saving equipment and techniques were employed in an effort to save Leeanna but were unsuccessful.

 

Leeanna was in jail after being arrested for drug related charges and was scheduled to appear in Circuit Court this morning, (July 27, 2016) for a first judicial appearance, pending charges being filed by the prosecutor’s office. The Arkansas State Police was contacted and asked by me (Sheriff Bryan McJunkins) to conduct an investigation of the incident. A Special Agent with the Arkansas State Police was assigned and immediately began the investigation.

 

 

 

Bryan McJunkins,

Howard County Sheriff

 

 

Daniel Morel (51 yo from Hot Springs)

 

 

The Sheriff’s Office received calls on Sunday afternoon at approximately 1:20 about a blue truck having hit a couple of vehicles in Mineral Springs and drove away. Deputy Joey Davis responded to the calls and received more calls about the same vehicle hitting a parked vehicle and then threatening the owner. As Davis arrived in Mineral Springs he noticed a vehicle matching the blue truck earlier reported and he tried to make contact with the driver. As Davis pulled his car closer to the truck (facing each other) the man driving the truck just starred at Davis and then drove toward him almost ramming his car. Davis avoided the collision and continued to try and stop the truck. At this point the truck had driven by Davis and Davis was following it. The driver continued on residential streets in Mineral Springs with Davis following him with blue lights on trying to stop the truck. Davis said the driver was driving at a very slow speed and starring at Davis in the driver’s mirror, putting the truck in reverse when Davis would get close and driving backwards trying to hit Davis' patrol car. Davis continued to avoid the collision as the pursuit continued at a slow speed on city streets. I (Bryan McJunkins) heard these calls and Davis’ radio traffic and went to assist Davis. Nashville Officer, Greg Parker also went to Mineral Springs to assist Davis. Parker and I arrived at the same time and Parker positioned his vehicle in front of and facing the truck Davis was pursuing and made the vehicle stop. Davis and I had to physically remove the driver from the truck after Davis leaned in the cab of the truck and placed the truck in park. Vehicle information showed the truck was owned by L&W Scrap Metal and was stolen from the scrap yard. The driver of the stolen truck was later identified as (Daniel Morel of Hot Springs, AR.)  and that he left behind his vehicle at the scrap yard when he took the blue work truck from there. Morel had to forcibly open the locked gate at the scrap yard to gain entry. The work truck Morel took was loaded with a welder, compressor, and other equipment and tools. The vehicles were recovered and Morel arrested for multiple counts of Aggravated Assault, Theft of Property, Breaking or Entering, and Criminal Mischief. All are felony charges and no bond has been set as of this press release.

 

Thank you.

 

Bryan McJunkins, Sheriff

Timothy Headrick (28 yo, of Texarkana)

 

Deputy Dustin Wakefield stopped a vehicle on Hwy 27 and Midway Loop on May 28 at approximately 8 p.m. the vehicle was driven by Headrick and 33 yo Ashley Stine of Texarkana, Tx. was the passenger in the vehicle. Deputy Timmy Floyd was in the area and assisted Wakefield as the vehicle continued on to Midway Loop for a short distance before stopping. Deputy Tim Bowlin also arrived and assisted with the traffic stop. Wakefield could smell marijuana coming from the vehicle and driver, Timothy Headrick, and Headrick was later searched after speaking with him and him admitting to being around marijuana prior to the stop. While Wakefield was talking with Headrick he started stomping his feet and asking that Wakefield not send him back to the penitentiary. Headrick told deputies that he had some “dope” in the front console of the truck. Headrick had a set of scales in his pants pocket that had white residue on it and deputies located a small case inside the console that had some plastic bags in it that contain a crystal substance believed to be meth. Stine was searched also and a pipe used to smoke meth was found inside her purse. The two were arrested and taken to jail. Headrick remained arrested while Stine was released. Judge set Headrick’s bond at $75,000.00 for possession of Controlled Substance; methamphetamine and possession of drug paraphernalia.

 

Thank you.  

 

  

Bryan McJunkins, Sheriff

Orlando Dosia (30 yo, of Nashville)

 

K9 Deputy Travis Turner and Deputy Tim Bowlin stopped a Ford SUV, for a traffic violation on Magnolia Street in Nashville while patrolling on Hwy 371. The SUV was driven by Jeff Windham of Nashville and Dosia was the passenger in the vehicle. Deputies noticed both subjects moving around and acting very nervous. Turner used K9, “Kilo” to sniff the perimeter of the vehicle at which time Kilo indicated a positive response to the presence of narcotics. Deputies also noticed an open beer can in the front console and further noticed it fizzing abnormally. Turner and Bowlin also noticed a clear plastic bag with the corner torn from it along with some small shards of a substance believed to be methamphetamine. The two (Windham and Dosia) also said they were smoking marijuana prior to the stop. Windham and Dosia were arrested and the baggie, small pieces of suspected meth and the beer were taken to the sheriff’s office. Deputies suspected that more meth was put into the beer can in an attempt to destroy evidence. Investigator Blake Eudy came to assist Turner and Bowlin process the evidence and further test for drugs. While at the sheriff’s office Deputies and Investigators evaporated the beer and found approximately two grams of meth left behind. Dosia was arrested for Possession of Controlled Substance; Methamphetamine and Tampering with Physical Evidence. Both are felony charges and the judge has set his bond at $25,000.00.

 

 

Thank you.  

 

 
Bryan McJunkins, Sheriff

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