The Appeals Court found there was sufficient evidence presented to the jury to support each rape conviction. On the matter of the denial of Uren’s motion to suppress, the Appeals Court found that Uren “fails to demonstrate reversible error.”
In mid-August 2023, the then 40-year-old Uren was found guilty by a Baxter County Circuit Court jury of having inappropriate sexual contact with his two daughters.
Uren alleged that certain statements he made to investigators should not have been admitted as evidence because he had not been properly informed of his rights.
A pre-trial hearing was held in Baxter County Circuit Court on Uren’s motion to suppress on June 29, 2023, and retired Circuit Judge Gordon Webb, who was handling the case on assignment by the Arkansas Supreme Court, ruled against Uren.
After the verdict in Uren’s case, he appealed his conviction, claiming his suppression motion should have been approved by Judge Webb which would have prevented use of much of the state’s evidence such as the interviews Uren had with investigators.
In the case of the Uren appeal, there were video exhibits that were admitted during the suppression hearing and a video exhibit that was admitted at trial that were reportedly not included in the record submitted to the court of appeals.
The evidence, including videos of interviews done with Uren that were on a flash drive, was still in the possession of the court reporter who worked the suppression hearing.
When Judge Webb contacted the reporter about the situation, she is said to have quickly found the flash drive containing evidence from the suppression hearing and Deputy Prosecutor John Russo retrieved the flash drive from the reporter.
The evidence was then supplied to the Court of Appeals so that the record of the suppression hearing would be complete.
Uren’s argument was basically that he had not been property mirandized at one point during his interrogation when another investigator had replaced the two who had been interviewing him after a 15-minute break.
Judge Webb said after reviewing the record and the testimony of witnesses at the 2023 suppression hearing he felt the session with the first two investigators and the third who took over after the break “was one continuous interview.”
Judge Webb wrote that Uren had been advised of his rights before the interview began and “there was no need to re-mirandize him” following the short break.
Uren’s defense attorney also alleged that his client had a low IQ rendering him “uniquely susceptible to high pressure interrogation tactics.”
Judge Webb said the manner in which Uren handled the interview sessions with investigators served to prove the opposite. He wrote in this ruling that Uren did not “appear anywhere close to being disabled intellectually.”
The judge said Uren’s history also served to disprove the defense contention. He said it had been pointed out that Uren had run his own lawn care business successfully, paid household bills, owned a vehicle . and has a long history of normal adult behavior.
In concluding his written ruling on the motion to suppress, Judge Webb said the “state has proven by a preponderance of evidence that Uren freely and voluntarily waived his right to remain silent and that he was fully and property advised of his rights.”
The Court of Appeals agreed.
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