Files detail SAU execs’ exchanges after killing
The vice president for students affairs of Southern Arkansas University called a judge’s gag order limiting publicity of an Aug. 11 campus shooting “wonderful for us,” according to correspondence records provided to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in response to a public records request.
The Arkansas Supreme Court on Sept. 17 placed a stay on the gag order, pending further review by the court, after attorneys for the Democrat-Gazette and the
Arkansas Press Association challenged the order. Judge David Talley Jr. of the 13th Judicial Circuit issued the gag order last month, saying he was “just watching out for both sides.”
Before this week, Southern Arkansas University had declined to release correspondence records pertaining to the shooting in response to an Arkansas Freedom of Information Act request, citing the gag order. The university has yet to release police records related to the shooting, even after the Supreme Court issued the stay.
The shooting on the Magnolia campus left 21-year-old engineering physics major Joshua Keshun Smith dead. Another unidentified student was hospitalized. The shooting took place in a campus parking lot in the early morning hours before the start of the first day of fall courses, officials said.
Four men, three of them SAU students with previous ties to the school’s football program, are being held in the Columbia County jail in connection with the shooting. They face capital-murder and aggravated-robbery charges.
Other details that could potentially shed light on a motive, as well as events leading up to the shooting, have been limited since last month, largely because Talley issued four expansive orders on publicity for each of the four defendants. The language of the judge’s gag order barred many categories of people from discussing the case or releasing certain documents, with a few exceptions.
Additionally, Talley asked the clerk to seal all documents, including probable-cause affidavits, in the case Aug. 17, the same day the four men were arraigned, records show.
Some students criticized campus officials for moving ahead with the first day of classes as planned and not closing the campus after the shooting.
According to the previously undisclosed records, shortly before noon Aug. 17, Donna Allen, the university’s vice president for student affairs, told the university president via email, “There will be a gag order put in place by the judge in court today regarding the case. That’s wonderful for us.”
Trey Berry, the university president, replied several minutes later to ask, “[What] does that mean for my video??”
According to Allen, Berry was referring to a draft video message intended for the campus community that was ultimately revised because of the gag order. A short video featuring Berry was posted online three days later, Aug. 20, in which he offered words of encouragement to the campus in light of the troubling start to the semester.
Last month, Allen denied a Democrat-Gazette request for the correspondence records.
“I would be more than happy to comply if you reach out to him [Judge Talley] and find that Judge Talley releases us from the GAG [sic] order,” Allen wrote to a reporter Aug. 20.
Records released this week show that at the same time, Allen had informed Berry and two other university officials that she had spoken with Ryan Phillips, a Columbia County deputy prosecuting attorney working on the case, regarding the media inquiry. According to Allen’s email to the other officials, Phillips told her “he thinks we are perfectly fine not responding and to respond something like I did below.” Allen included the text she later sent to the Democrat-Gazette, which said she was unable to comply with the records request.
Berry wrote back, “I think this is very appropriate and it will be good to have the backing of Ryan [Phillips] and Judge Talley.”
When asked Wednesday why she described the gag order as “wonderful,” Allen wrote in an email to the Democrat-Gazette, “Because it was an ongoing investigation and we did not want anything to hinder this investigation and the gag order appeared to assist that the investigation would not be hindered or compromised.”
Additional text message records show that Berry and Allen assessed the media coverage of the shooting and expressed fears that the mother of the shooting victim had found out about her son’s death from social media rather than from law enforcement.
At one point in the text exchange, Berry asked if the Dallas County sheriff’s office had arrived at the mother’s house yet, to which Allen replied, “No.”
“Geez!” Berry wrote back. However, Allen denied Wednesday that Smith’s mother learned of his death from social media.
“We later learned that law enforcement was able to make contact with her prior to her hearing it in any other manner,” Allen wrote in an email to the Democrat-Gazette.
At one point, according to a copy of his text exchange with Allen, Berry wrote, “I do know 99% that the mother found out through social media before law enforcement found her.”
Ronnie Smith, an investigator with the Dallas County sheriff’s office and no relation to the student’s mother, said in an interview Wednesday that in the aftermath of the shooting he attempted to contact the student’s mother at a Sparkman address.
However, upon reaching the residence early that morning, the house appeared to be empty. He eventually learned from one of her relatives in the area that the student’s mother had moved to Arkadelphia, Smith said.
After the nearby relatives learned why Smith was there, they told Smith that they wanted to notify the mother in person regarding her son’s death. They would not give the officer a phone number because they did not want her to receive the news over the phone, the investigator recalled.
When asked Wednesday about the basis for their concerns regarding Joshua Keshun Smith’s mother, Allen wrote in an email, “Because we were sensitive to the situation and we were gravely concerned because the Mother had commented on Facebook that she had tried to call her son and couldn’t reach him and could we please check on him.”
She went on, “The University, at the request of the University Police Department and in cooperation with the Arkansas State Police and the Magnolia Police, refrained from publishing any detailed information until 7:50 a.m. after absolute confirmation was received that the next of kin had been notified in person.”
The university this week declined to release police reports or other police records pertaining to the shooting, even after the Supreme Court issued a stay on the gag order.
Allen in an email Tuesday denied the request for police records “at this point in time.” She cited language in the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act exempting the disclosure of records related to “undisclosed investigations by law enforcement agencies of suspected criminal activity.”
Members of the University Police Department “are in an ongoing investigation and still gathering information,” Allen wrote.
Jeff Rogers, the prosecuting attorney for the 13th Judicial District, did not respond when asked last week if he believed the gag order was still in place.
The shooting on the Magnolia campus left 21-year-old engineering physics major Joshua Keshun Smith dead. Another unidentified student was hospitalized.