Arkansas has had its share of notable corruption cases over the years, including when the governor who succeeded Bill Clinton was convicted in a Whitewater-related probe and when a state treasurer was caught accepting bribes stashed in pie boxes. read more >
The story about the mental health services provider that ripped off both taxpayers and the mentally ill reveals what happens when bureaucrats and lawmakers surrender their oversight duties to highly conflicted parties. read more >
Everyone knows the reason for a lobbyist's existence: to persuade lawmakers to do what the lobbyist wants him to do. But when lobbyists actually pay lawmakers — well, that’s influence of a whole other magnitude. read more >
Quapaw House Inc. of Hot Springs finalizes plans to acquire the Arkansas assets of Preferred Family Healthcare of Springfield, Missouri, the scandal-plagued behavioral health provider that was cut off from state Medicaid payments earlier this year. read more >
The end of Preferred Family Healthcare’s implosion in Arkansas, which jolted the state’s Medicaid service industry and scarred its political landscape, came not with a bang, but with a text. read more >
I have a couple of favorite topics: white-collar crime and personal finance. A story that combines the two is as irresistible as chocolate and peanut butter. read more >
An Arkansas mental health treatment company says it's working to purchase the Arkansas operations of a similar Missouri company tied to a political corruption investigation. read more >
Former state Rep. Micah Neal, who pleaded guilty last year to a corruption charge related to a kickbacks scheme involving Ecclesia College in Springdale, was sentenced Thursday to three years of probation. "I threw it all away, there are no excuses on my part," Neal told the court. read more >
Oren Paris III, the former president of Ecclesia College in Springdale, was sentenced Wednesday to three years in prison for his role in a corruption scandal involving kickbacks on state grants. read more >
I never want anyone to be a crook, you know, but nothing pleases me more than seeing crooks get caught and punished. If there was a radio call-in show for federal court spectators, I’d be on a first-name basis with the screener. read more >
Jon Woods, the former state senator from Springdale, is scheduled for sentencing Wednesday in Fayetteville, and his co-defendant in a notorious public corruption case will be sentenced by U.S. District Judge Timothy Brooks on Thursday. read more >
Oh, to have the power to subpoena people who could answer my burning questions and then force them to speak under oath! Some of the questions I still want answered date back a decade and more: read more >
Federal prosecutors say Jerry Walsh, the former longtime director of the South Arkansas Youth Services Inc. of Magnolia, pleaded guilty to conspiring to misapply more than $380,000 from the now-defunct organization. read more >
Every minute of every day, Asa Hutchinson is a governor, a former federal prosecutor and an uncle. With a nephew implicated in a bribery and corruption case, holding all three roles cannot be easy for him. read more >
Is it possible that Rusty Cranford believed he was bribing Jeremy Hutchinson for legislative actions, but Hutchinson thought he was being paid only for legal work? read more >
Legislative leaders apparently think that one can be elected to the highest deliberative body in Arkansas government and not know that ethics — as in having some — are good. read more >
A corruption probe that's already ensnared a prolific lobbyist and two ex-lawmakers implicated a state senator who also happens to be a nephew of the governor. A member of the panel licensing medical marijuana facilities says an unsuccessful applicant offered him a bribe that he didn't accept but also didn't immediately report. read more >
Former lobbyist Milton Russell "Rusty" Cranford of Rogers pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday to bribing Arkansas elected officials in what prosecutors called a "multimillion-dollar scheme." read more >
Centennial Bank of Conway has sued state Sen. Jeremy Hutchinson for $30,037.69, plus interest and late fees, the unpaid balance of a $50,000 business loan made to him in 2011. read more >
The public corruption being described in fascinating, horrifying detail in a federal courtroom in Fayetteville illustrates how public officials counted on public money and conspired to get it. read more >
