A Mountain Home man facing state and federal drug charges is in the process of filing civil lawsuits in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Arkansas against lawmen in Baxter and Washington Counties in which he says he will seek millions of dollars in damages.
He has indicated he will be acting as his own attorney.
Thirty-five-year-old Wesley Grant Bray’s suit against Baxter County lawmen has to do with the investigation that led to the discovery of a significant amount of methamphetamine in and around a residence along U.S. Highway 62 East.
At the time Wesley Bray and his wife, 25-year-old Hannah Smolek Bray, were living there.
DOMESTIC DISTURBANCE CALL
The incident started with a 911 call made by Hannah Smolek Bray reporting a domestic disturbance involving a firearm.
Deputies met with Hannah Bray at a Mountain Home grocery store to talk about what had happened.
She is reported to have told the deputies that her husband had gained control of her handgun and pointed it in her direction and that of the couple’s infant son.
The woman is alleged to have said her husband was making “paranoid, irrational statements about someone coming to kill him.”
When deputies checked the house where the domestic was reported to have taken place, they reporting seeing a bullet hole in the wall and a quantity of suspected methamphetamine.
A search warrant was obtained and the substance the deputies had initially seen tested positive for methamphetamine. A small amount of cash and two vehicles were also seized.
Wesley Bray was reported to have driven away from the property in a highly intoxicated state, according to the probable cause affidavit.
A second 911 call reported a man who was said to be jumping into the traffic lanes of a county road in the same vicinity where the alleged domestic disturbance had taken place.
The unidentified man turned out to be Wesley Bray. In addition to jumping into traffic lanes, he was also reported to be throwing rocks at vehicles. He claimed to have been involved in an accident in his 2008 Chevrolet Equinox. The vehicle was located along County Road 419 where it had crashed through a fence and come to rest in a clump of trees.
Court records show that Wesley Bray has been charged with various crimes in Baxter, Izard and Stone Counties. His charges have included drug possession, false imprisonment, residential burglary and theft of property. In one Izard County case, he was reported to have been given 20 years in state prison on drug-related charges.
Hannah Smolek Bray was arrested based on evidence obtained through the search warrant served on the property where she lived with her husband.
According to the probable cause affidavit, deputies discovered almost 11 pounds of methamphetamine in a vehicle parked on the property. The drug was reported to have belonged to 23-year-old Cameron Baker who was also arrested and charged in federal and state criminal cases involving the trafficking of narcotics.
Baker was also reported to have been the person renting the property where the domestic dispute took place and allowing Wesley Bray and his wife to live there.
Federal court records show Baker intends to enter a guilty plea to the federal charges against him.
ALLEGES INTIMIDATION
In his federal court civil case against the Baxter County Sheriff’s Office, Wesley Bray says his wife did meet with deputies to discuss the domestic disturbance incident but that she did not want to make a statement, did not want an investigation and did not want to have him arrested.
He said the two deputies “then began to threaten and intimidate” his wife until she agreed and “wrote the affidavit the officers wanted.”
He alleges the searches in which officers found a substantial amount of methamphetamine were illegal for a number of reasons.
Bray claims that a Baxter County criminal investigator made “knowingly false statements” on the affidavit seeking a search warrant for the property where the Brays lived, “with the intent of deceiving the issuing judge.”
Bray alleges that “Baxter County investigators have been indoctrinated to believe that their actions and beliefs are the law. It is their custom to disregard state, federal and Constitutional law in order to make arrests.”
Bray says his 4th, 5th and 14th amendment rights were violated.
BRAY SAYS LOST IT ALL
He says because of the officers’ actions, federal and state criminal charges have been filed against him and his wife, he has lost his child, his house, his vehicles and most of his “earthy possessions” and has endured “mental anguish and emotional distress”.
In both the Baxter and Washington County suits, the federal district court has citied deficiencies in Bray’s initial complaints saying he failed to “affirmatively link” the conduct of each individual defendant directly to specific claimed violations of his constitutional rights.
He has been instructed to alter the complaints so that they meet the court’s request for him to spell out those direct connections.
An amended complaint was filed in the Baxter County suit August 14 but no review notes are posted on electronic court records so it is not possible to tell at this point if the revised complaint meets the court’s requirements.
In the Washington County case, Bray has been ordered to submit a second amended complaint after the initial amended complaint was found to contain deficiencies related to affirmative links being established between the defendants and claimed violations of Bray’s constitutional rights.
SUIT FILED AGAINST WASHINGTON COUNTY DETENTION CENTER STAFF
In the suit Bray is attempting to file against personnel in the Washington County Sheriff’s Office and Detention Center, he alleges various grievances against the facility staff. He contends that staff at the jail have retaliated in various ways because he has been filing grievances and that he “fears for his safety” because of those actions.
He is being held in the Washington County Detention Center while his criminal drug case is being processed through the federal court system.
Bray alleges he was threatened and intimidated by jail staff and when he filed a grievance about the treatment, “it was glossed over and ignored.”
In addition to harassment, Wesley Bray claims staff at the Washington County Sheriff’s Office replaced inmate’s towels and blankets “with items of lesser quality.”
As with the suit against Baxter County Sheriff’s office personnel, Bray is claiming violations of his constitutional rights in the Washington County suit.
In the suit he is in the process of filing against Baxter County, there appear to be nine defendants and the Washington County suit names 12 defendants.
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