Lawrence County Judge still recovering from surgeries following auto accident

Lawrence County Judge Dale Freeman hasn’t spoken since a car crash more than two weeks ago, Talk Business and Politics has learned. The 75-year-old judge has been moved from the intensive care unit at a Little Rock hospital to a private room.

Freeman is breathing on his own, but he is still recovering from two surgeries on his neck, and other procedures to repair injuries he suffered. He’s been on a feeding tube. Doctors are not sure when the judge will be able to speak, according to family members.

The judge’s injuries come at a crucial time in the county. Construction is about to begin on a new $8.5 million jail in Walnut Ridge. Arkansas Jail Standards told county officials in 2014 the county jail had to be replaced because of a lack of inmate space, safety problems, overcrowding, and other issues.

Voters approved a 3/8-cent sales tax hike in November 2015 to pay for the construction of the jail. It has a sunset clause set to expire in 22 years. Voters also approved a 1/8-cent sales tax increase to pay for maintenance of the 100-bed facility. It’s a permanent hike. The sales tax increases mean most of the county has a 10-cent on every dollar sales tax rate. It will take about 18-months to complete the jail.

Freeman is the chief executive in the county, and when different phases of the jail construction projects are ready, he has to sign the actual contracts, Justice of the Peace Lloyd Clark told Talk Business & Politics. Those contracts will be ready in the coming weeks. What the county will do if Freeman hasn’t recovered by then is uncertain, Clark said. Department heads are able to run the day-to-day operations in the county without the judge, but circumstances like this are impossible to get around, he said.

There has been no move by the Quorum Court to remove Freeman from his office because he is incapacitated, and no one wants to do that, Clark said. Hopefully, the judge will recover enough to get the jail project started, and then get back to work at some point, he said. Freeman won the Democratic Primary earlier this spring and does not have an opponent in the November general election, according to the Lawrence County Clerk’s Office.

Freeman was southbound on U.S. 67 at 5 a.m. on Aug. 17 near Cabot when his truck left the roadway and flipped into a ditch, according to the Arkansas State Police. The judge had to be extricated from his vehicle and airlifted to a nearby hospital, where he remained in a medically induced coma for days. A timetable for his recovery has not been released by doctors.