A habitual offender on parole who threatened a woman with a gun in a store parking lot last year was sentenced to five years in prison Tuesday after pleading guilty to charges in Garland County Circuit Court.
Billie Gene Farris, 35, of Hot Springs, who has remained in custody since his arrest, pleaded guilty to felony counts of aggravated assault and possession of a firearm by certain persons and was sentenced to five years on each count, to run concurrently, and ordered to pay $170 in court costs.
Harris is classified as a habitual offender, having been convicted on June 29, 2005, in Logan County of two counts of residential burglary, two counts of commercial burglary, breaking or entering, theft of property and second-degree escape.
Another convicted felon, Joseph Allen Patrick, 38, who was arrested at the same time as Farris on a charge of possession of a firearm by certain persons, is scheduled for a hearing June 12 in circuit court to determine the admissibility of statements he made to Hot Springs police.
According to the probable cause affidavit, on Dec. 12, 2017, shortly before 10 p.m., Officer Wes Smith responded to Walmart, 1601 Albert Pike, in reference to an assault with a firearm. A local woman stated a truck had been following her around the parking lot and one of the occupants pointed a gun at her.
She said she left the store around 9:30 p.m. and saw two men staring at her from a small gray truck with large amounts of trash in the bed. As she attempted to leave, the truck began following her around the parking lot.
She told Smith she pulled into another spot in the parking lot and the truck pulled up on the passenger side of her vehicle. The driver, later identified as Farris, pointed a black handgun at her.
Upon reviewing video surveillance footage from the Walmart parking lot, Garland County Sheriff's deputy Joseph Parker recognized the vehicle from a traffic stop he had conducted the night before. Parker was able to identify the occupants of the truck as Farris and Patrick.
Officers located the truck at a gas station at Albert Pike and Thornton Ferry roads and Smith made a traffic stop. He located Farris and Patrick inside and found a black .45-caliber handgun on the dash. The woman was brought to the scene and identified Farris as the one who had pointed a gun at her.
Both Farris and Patrick, who was previously convicted of second-degree forgery in Pulaski County in 2001, were taken into custody.
Local on 05/11/2018