By KENDALL OWENS
T-H Staff Writer
Defendants in circuit court who use the Public Defender's Office in the First Judicial District will now be appointed one of three attorneys after changes were made in that office last month, but are currently taking effect.
According to St. Francis County officials, Ray Waters of Augusta, was recently appointed as the managing public defender for the district which includes St. Francis, Crittenden, Cross, Lee, Phillips, Monroe and Woodruff counties. Waters will serve as the full-time defender for the district with Jennifer Hicky-Collins and Marshall Wright serving as part-time assistant public defenders.
"We think that this will be a better set up for everyone concerned. It will give us a little more flexibility to try to get all of the caseload taken care of," said Waters.
According to Waters, Hicky-Collins and Wright will have primary responsibility for cases in Lee and St. Francis counties, but will work across the district as necessary.
"They will work primarily in St. Francis and Lee counties, but when they are needed in other counties we will use them. This way it works out and eases some of the cases on everyone and helps to better work with the dockets," Waters said.
Both Hicky-Collins and Wright said they were looking forward to the new opportunity.
"I'm very happy to be working with the Public Defender's Commission and very excited about this opportunity to serve St. Francis and Lee counties," Hicky-Collins said.
Wright echoed Hicky-Collins sentiments saying, "I'm just looking forward to doing the job and things are already starting to get rolling. I'm looking forward to working with the prosecutor's office, and I think this will make things work better for everyone involved."
Another change in the office was the resignation last week of St. Francis County Public Defender Dan McGill. Officials at the courthouse had been asking for a change in the office for the past several months.
According to reports from the St. Francis County Circuit Clerk's Office and the office of the Circuit Court Coordinator, in November, McGill disposed of 44 out of 218 cases during the final term of court for 2003. McGill offered no comment on his resignation, but said he is opening a private practice.
With the changes in the office, St. Francis County Justices of the Peace will also have to make a decision on what to do with the building which houses the office on Cross Street. According to St. Francis County Judge Carl Cisco, the only current change will be the relocation of the public defender's secretary back into the courthouse.
"We're probably going to end up moving the secretary back into an office in the courthouse, but we don't know what's going to happen with the building yet," Cisco said.
"We've really got a space crunch up here, so we will have to make a decision on whether we want to increase our parking space or whether we want to use the building as storage. That's something that we will be deciding at meetings over the next few months," he said.
County government purchased the building and property for over
$80,000 and spent close to $20,000 in 2002 renovating the building
to move the Public Defender's Office from the courthouse.
People surfing the Internet for information on Forrest City recently may have found a website promoting a class reunion in Wynne instead.
The website, forrestcityar.com, displays information for a Wynne High School 1961 class reunion, along with healthcare information.
The website was designed by Wynne native Dr. Sam McGuire. McGuire practiced medicine at one point in Forrest City, but now has an office in Little Rock.
McGuire was somewhat surprised that the website had just been discovered by local citizens, considering he said he purchased the domain name about two years ago. "It's been there for a year and someone just noticed it?" McGuire asked.
"I'm actually a physician, but I do a lot of web work. About two years ago, I got word that big companies were buying up all of the {ar} sites, for example, wynnear.com; forrestcityar.com, etc., and reselling them for big bucks. I bought the wynnear.com site to use for myself because that's where my home is, and I have business there," McGuire said.
"I also have property in Forrest City, so I went ahead and bought it and stored it away so I would have it," McGuire said, explaining that when a website is being stored it can reveal several things to the Internet surfer. One way to store a website is to have it show 'under construction' when it is called up. Another way is for that web address to be directed toward another website, according to McGuire.
McGuire said paying to have an unused web address set up as an active website is also an option.
However, because he was using the wynnear.com website to promote his class reunion, McGuire said, "At the time, the best choice was to aim it (forrestcityar.com) at one I already had."
Forrest City has several websites promoting itself including the mayor's office at forrestcity-ar.com, and the Forrest City Area Chamber of Commerce office at forrestcitychamber.com
McGuire said the problem can easily be fixed.
"There's no big story behind this," McGuire chuckled. "I can cut that off immediately. It's not a big deal one way or another. If they want me to take that off, then I'll just figure out how to do it and do it."