Man gets eight years for cocaine, failure to appear

A 41-year-old Little Rock man received an eight-year prison sentence Monday for cocaine possession, almost two years after he failed to show up for a court appearance on the charge.

Jamie Christopher Warren, a son of a Pulaski County circuit judge, had been a fugitive for about 20 months when he was arrested in Houston on Oct. 5, court records show.

He pleaded guilty Monday to failure to appear and possession of a controlled substance with the purpose to distribute, both Class C felony charges that carry up to 10 years in prison each.

Circuit Judge Barry Sims imposed the sentence recommended by special prosecutor Jason Barrett.

Under the plea arrangement negotiated by Warren’s attorney, Marion Humphrey, gun and drug paraphernalia charges also stemming from Warren’s Feb. 26, 2014, arrest were dropped.

Warren is the second of three sons of Judge Joyce Warren, the first black woman to hold a judgeship in Arkansas and the first to be elected circuit judge, and her husband of 44 years, James Medrick Warren, a retired former assistant superintendent at the Pulaski County Special School District.

Jail records show Jamie Warren, married since 2004 with at least one child, has had no visitors since being returned to the Pulaski County jail Oct. 18. There did not appear to be any family members in court Monday. The Warrens did not return a phone message Monday evening.

More than 10 years ago, a Pulaski County jury convicted Warren of first-degree battery for shooting a man in the back in the living room of a Little Rock drug dealer.

Monday was the first time since Jan. 15, 2015, that Warren has appeared in circuit court. A warrant for failure to appear was issued on Feb. 17, 2015, after Warren did not show up for a court appearance.

According to a 2014 arrest report, Warren was a passenger in a gold Cadillac Escalade that sheriff’s Deputy James Koch saw on Geyer Springs Road with a license plate registered to another vehicle. The deputy pulled over the sport utility vehicle on Interstate 30 East, just west of Scott Hamilton Road.

The driver, Mark Myers Jr., provided documentation showing he’d purchased the vehicle two weeks earlier and hadn’t transferred his tags yet, the report said.

When asked if there was anything illegal in the vehicle, Myers said there was a Smith & Wesson pistol under the front passenger seat where Warren was sitting.

When Koch retrieved the loaded gun, Warren said the pistol was his and that he was preparing to get his concealed-carry license, the report states.

But a background check showed Warren’s 2006 first-degree battery conviction, and deputies found a small plastic bag of cocaine, the report said. Officers also found 91 small plastic bags and measuring scales in the vehicle.

Myers was released with a warning after he told deputies there could be more drugs in the hotel room the men had just left, the report stated.

Myers directed deputies to a room at the Quality Inn Suites at 6100 Mitchell Drive where they arrested Crystal Cummings. She was charged with promoting prostitution, a felony, and misdemeanor marijuana possession after deputies found 12.7 grams of the drug, along with two marijuana cigarettes and 12 partially burned marijuana cigarettes, seven of them in Cummings’ purse.

Cummings pleaded guilty to the marijuana charge in May 2014 and was fined $500. The prostitution charge was dismissed in October 2014 after she completed community service work, court files show.

Court records in Harris County, Texas, show Warren was arrested in Houston almost three weeks ago and returned to Little Rock last week after waiving extradition.

Details of how Houston police came to take him into custody were not available on Monday. The address listed on his court file in Houston is for a Just Brakes shop at 8700 Richmond Ave. in Houston.

The records also show Warren was arrested in Houston in March 2010 on a misdemeanor marijuana charge to which he pleaded guilty after spending three days in jail.

A jury in February 2006 rejected Jamie Warren’s claim of self-defense for shooting then-23-year-old Nicholas Antonio Eagle but cleared Warren of a more serious charge of aggravated robbery. Eagle had accused Warren of stealing $1,000 that he had brought to the home of Robert Phillip Brevard III to buy a car. Warren said Brevard had been a friend since childhood.

Warren was sentenced to five years’ probation. The conviction has since been expunged.