Convicted Ex-Arkansas Senator's Request For New Trial Rejected By Federal Panel

By Hunter Field, Arkansas Advocate

August 31, 2022

A three-judge panel of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday upheld a lower-court ruling rejecting former Arkansas state Sen. Jon Wood’s request for a new trial after his conviction in a bribery and kickback scheme.

Woods, who is serving an 18-year, four-month sentence, argued that he should receive a new trial based on newly-discovered evidence.

However, the panel agreed with U.S. District Judge for the Western District of Arkansas Timothy Brooks that the evidence was neither material nor exculpatory.

Jon Woods

Woods, a Republican from Springdale, was found guilty in 2018 of 15 counts of public corruption in the kickback scheme involving state tax dollars. In addition to prison time, a judge ordered him to pay $1.6 million in restitution to the state.

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The federal probe ensnared four other state legislators who pleaded guilty or were convicted as well as more than a dozen others outside of state government who benefited from the scheme, mostly employees of Missouri nonprofit Preferred Family Healthcare.

Wood’s appeal for a new trial raised two main points.

First, he argued former state Sen. Jeremy Hutchinson, R-Little Rock, provided federal investigators with information about Woods that was protected by attorney-client privilege. (Hutchinson is the nephew of Gov. Asa Hutchinson. He pleaded guilty to accepting bribes in 2019 and is awaiting sentencing.)

The 8th Circuit panel rejected this argument, ruling that one individual’s attorney-client privilege does not extend to others.

Second, Woods argued that a federal investigator’s notes of an interview with Hutchinson were withheld. Those notes, Woods claimed, showed that his future wife, Christina Mitchell, was vetted and qualified for a job that federal prosecutors alleged she received as part of the kickback scheme in exchange for Woods directing public funds to the organization.

The federal appellate panel ruled the evidence was not material “because it does little to show the absence of a quid pro quo exchange.”

The Wednesday opinion also noted that a witness at the trial testified that Mitchell was the most qualified applicant and that prosecutors never argued that she was unqualified.

The Arkansas Advocate is a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization dedicated to tough, fair daily reporting and investigative journalism that holds public officials accountable and focuses on the relationship between the lives of Arkansans and public policy. This service is free to readers and other news outlets.