A man originally charged with forcing a female at gunpoint to leave a residence on Old Tracy Ferry Road and accompany him pled to reduced charges during a session of Baxter County Circuit Court Tuesday and was sentenced to eight years in prison.
Thirty-six-year-old Eli Michael Weedman was set to go to trial this week, but accepted a plea agreement instead. He was facing charges in three active criminal cases stemming from events in mid-May last year. The original charges included kidnapping, aggravated robbery, aggravated assault, residential burglary, being a felon in possession of a firearm, possession of drugs and drug paraphernalia and criminal mischief.
A number of the charges were dropped by the state. Two of the major players in the incident — 24-year-old Joseph Rowden and 37-year-old Jamye Waldrip — purportedly recanted their original statements given to investigators which incriminated Weedman. Rowden said he was drunk when investigators questioned him, and Waldrip claims she is bipolar and intimidated when around law officers.
Weedman has a long list of prior arrests, criminal charges, convictions and stays in both the state prison system and the Baxter County jail. At one point, according to the Arkansas Crime Information Center, Weedman had 17 previous felony convictions on his record. In mid-2018, he had been booked into the Baxter County jail 36 times since 2000, according to jail records. He is currently an inmate in the North Central Unit of the state prison system at Calico Rock on an earlier conviction.
Because of his criminal history, Circuit Judge Gordon Webb sentenced Weedman as a habitual offender on the remaining charges, including aggravated assault, possession of methamphetamine and paraphernalia to ingest the drug, and being a felon in possession of a firearm.
The latest charges were filed against him after he was alleged to have gone to the residence on Old Tracy Ferry Road with a male companion. The companion, originally referred to in investigative reports as “Youngblood,” has since been identified as Jonathan Cole Smith Jr.
Smith is in the Baxter County jail on other charges, including allegedly participating in an assault on a Gassville man.
According to the probable cause affidavit, Smith is alleged to have kicked the door to the residence open. Rowden was in the house at the time and initially told investigators Weedman had forced Waldrip at gunpoint to leave with him. According to investigators, Waldrip was alleged to have struggled with Weedman over the weapon. During the fracas, Rowden was reported to have fled out the back door of the residence to get help.
Waldrip’s affidavit recanting her original statements contains a description of her relationship with Weedman. She writes, “I have been involved with Mr. Weedman since 2011. He is my friend, companion and — one day — husband.” She asked he be released as soon as possible.
Weedman has denied forcing Waldrip — whom he says he lived with at the Old Tracy Ferry Road address and describes as a friend — to go with him. He says he merely rode with her as she drove to work at a Mountain Home motel.
When Waldrip was initially interviewed, she told a much different story. She alleged she was convinced Weedman would harm her if she did not go with him. She said he had threatened her with bodily harm the day before the May 13 incident.
Weedman contends the residence on Old Tracy Ferry Road is his home. He wrote he did not understand how a person could be charged with burglarizing his own home. In other documents, Weedman goes to great lengths to refute the validity of information provided by investigators on a point-by-point basis.
According to court records, police received a tip as to Weedman’s whereabouts the day after the incident on Old Tracy Ferry Road. He was located at a house along South Street in Mountain Home. During the arrest, officers reported finding prescription drugs and drug paraphernalia in the house. Weedman picked up drug charges related to his arrest. He had raised strong objections to those charges contending he did not live at the home where officers arrested him.
He says it was his sister who lived at the South Street address and the drugs and drug paraphernalia belonged to her, not him.
Again, acting as his own attorney and writing from prison, Weedman filed a number of motions, including one to suppress evidence obtained during his arrest.
In one document, Weedman contends he was being “prosecuted for who I am” rather than what he is accused of doing. Despite his 17 prior felony convictions, he proclaims he is “not a lifelong criminal,” but a “man who has battled addictions since youth.”
WebReadyTM Powered by WireReady® NSI