225-year sentence could be longest in district history

Jurors after 2 a.m., Saturday sentenced two men convicted Friday for bank robbery, to what Prosecuting Attorney Marcus Vaden believes is the longest punishment delivered in the history of Judicial District 20.

James Walker, 25, and Cornelius Paige, 32, both of Orlando, Fla., were each sentenced to 50 years in Arkansas Department of Correction for the aggravated robbery of First Arkansas Bank and Trust; 35 years for attempted capital murder of a state trooper; 25 for theft; 20 for aggravated assault and 10 for felony fleeing.

Paige

Both men were sentenced to 35 years for kidnapping one of three bank workers on the morning of April 13, 2007, and to two 25-year terms for kidnapping the other two workers. The men were ordered to serve 30 days in the county jail and fined $100 for misdemeanor fleeing after exiting a maroon Chevrolet Impala at White City Road and Highway 365.

Circuit Judge David Reynolds told the men after three days of trial Saturday morning that the 35-year kidnapping and attempted murder charges are to run concurrently with one another, but consecutive to the 50-year robbery sentences. The remaining charges are to be served concurrently, Reynolds said.

Without consulting district circuit clerks, whose offices were closed Saturday, officials contacted said that aside from multiple life sentences handed down in previous cases, numerically the 225-year punishment administered Saturday morning could be the longest in district history.

.story-ad {

width: 310px;

float: left;

margin: 0 10px 10px 0;

padding: 4px;

}

- Advertisement -

OAS_AD('x22');

Vaden said after sentencing that he was impressed by the attentiveness shown by Faulkner County jurors, who on Friday afternoon were asking bailiffs for more note pads, and who took more than seven combined hours to deliberate verdict and sentencing.

Identical guilty verdicts were delivered late Friday night for the men charged with robbing the bank, beating a worker afterward and shooting at Arkansas State Police Cpl. Gregg Bray, who apprehended Walker and Paige along with sheriff's deputy Mike Wilkins after the ensuing car chase. "The jurors took their time and made sure the appropriate sentences were handed out, and we're thankful for this," Vaden said. "These men are dangerous. They have two previous convictions in Florida, and would've had more, but witnesses in the past were too afraid to show up and testify. Our witnesses from the bank and trooper Bray showed a lot of courage. Also, I have to say that deputy prosecutor Joe Don Winningham was outstanding in the trial."

On Friday, Winningham called his last scheduled witness, a bank manager who said she saw the men's maroon four-door car with out-of-state tags pull through the bank and make a U-turn. According to the woman, the men grabbed her by the hair while inside the dark bank, threw her into the kitchen floor and pounded her head repeatedly after they had already obtained money from the vault.

The men kicked her "like a ball," according to the witness, who said she was pistol-whipped and forced into the bank vault with two tellers. The woman had been forced to crawl and "duck-walk," one said, into a vault from where more than $140,000 had been placed into an orange duffel bag by one of two masked robbers and one of the coerced tellers.

"What was the purpose of that?" Winningham said in his closing. "They already had the money. Why did they have to beat her?"

Walker

Agent Mike Dawson of ASP testified Thursday that $108,400 was recovered inside and around the car on April 13, 2007, at White City Road and 365, but $41,100 was still missing from the bank. On the next day, Dawson said he, Bray and Greenbrier Chief of Police Gene Earnhart went back to the woods near White City Road and found $33,000 of the bank's money wrapped in a black T-shirt where one of the defendants was found. Still missing in the heist is at least $8,000 of the bank's $20 bills, said Dawson, who also testified that once he'd made it to the scene that Friday, cash was "blowing across the field to the north."

The bank manager said Friday she had to have knee surgery after the robbers beat her, and that she has worn braces from being kicked in the face. Two tellers opened testimony Wednesday by saying that they're both emotionally traumatized to this day after two masked men sneaked up on them with a gun and a knife at 7:45 a.m., and forced one of them to unlock the vault and help load more than $140,000 into a orange duffel bag, which troopers recovered inside the Impala at White City Road.

Defense attorneys argued that the three tellers forced inside the vault were safe and free to walk out after the robbers fled with the vault door left partially open, and jurors convicted the men of a lesser kidnapping offense than originally charged. During trial Friday, Reynolds dismissed four additional attempted murder charges against the men, since defense attorneys argued that the six shots at Bray were all fired in a continuous action.

One of the last witnesses to testify Friday was the only one last week to be called by defense attorneys Sara Merritt, Jeff Wankum and Stuart Vess. Travis Allen, 23, of Orlando, said from the witness stand that he and a woman had travelled to Texas with Walker, Paige and driver Johnta Barber. Allen said the group may have then stayed a week in Missouri or Arkansas, but he wasn't sure. Agent Doug Estes of ASP later showed documents he found in the driver compartment of the men's Impala described as receipts for two Ramada Inn room reservations in Branson, Mo., from April 8 to 13, 2007.

Vaden asked Allen what he and the group were doing as they traveled around. Allen said they had "hung out," and were "playing the game." Vaden asked, "What game?"

Allen replied, "PlayStation."

Barber, 27, who was found in a mud hole on the day of the robbery after a six-hour search, faces as many felonies and further misdemeanor traffic offenses. He has been granted a motion for severance and would be tried independently.

(Staff writer Daniel Doyle can be reached by e-mail at daniel.doyle@thecabin.net or by phone at 505-1253)