Alabama: Crime and Corruption

NLR mayor subpoenaed in public corruption trial

LITTLE ROCK — North Little Rock Mayor Patrick Hays said today he has been subpoenaed as a defense witness in the federal trial of a city alderman named in a public corruption indictment.

Alderman Sam Baggett, a former arms dealer, faces six counts involving weapons transactions with co-defendant George Wylie Thompson, a reputed mobster from Cabot. Their trial began Tuesday.

Hays said today said a subpoena was faxed to his office while he was out of town.
“I haven’t talked to the lawyer and I really don’t know why I’m on there,” the mayor said. “I am assuming as a character witness” for Baggett, he said.

Baggett lawyer John Wesley Hall said earlier this week that 32 people were on the defense’s list of potential witnesses, including Hays and five current or former members of the city council.

Also on the list is former alderman Cary Gaines, who was named with Baggett and Thompson in a 2009 federal indictment.

Gaines pleaded guilty Monday to a conspiracy charge and admitted in court that he participated with Thompson in a scheme to rig bids for North Little Rock public works projects to pay gambling debts he said he owed to Thompson.

Testimony has proceeded slowly in the Baggett-Thompson trial. In court today, prosecutors played recordings from court-authorized wiretaps of conversations federal authorities say bolster their claims that Thompson bought and sold guns through Baggett.

Baggett is accused of selling guns and ammunition to a felon, Thompson, which is illegal.

Agents with the FBI and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives seized 147 guns and more than 87,000 rounds of ammunition in searches of Thompson properties in Cabot and northern Pulaski County.

Of the guns seized, 102 were introduced as evidence and filled up most of three tables in the center of the courtroom. Five silencers also were introduced.

ATF Special Agent Glen Jordan, who spent most of the day on the stand, conservatively estimated the value of the guns at $75,000.