Jones' plea: 'NOT guilty'
By John Joyce
Published in News on November 6, 2015 1:46 PM
Glenn Barfield, of the Goldsboro-based law firm Haithcock, Barfield, Hulse and Kinsey, issued a statement Thursday announcing that his firm will be representing Arnold Jones.
Jones, the senior resident Superior Court judge for District 8-B who is under federal indictment on charges of bribery and attempting to influence an official proceeding, will plead not guilty, Barfield said.
"He will vigorously contest the charges," Barfield said via email. He said rules governing the behavior of attorneys involved federal cases prevented him from commenting further.
"I am not in a position right now to explain what I mean by 'vigorously,'" Barfield said.
According to the indictment, Jones offered to compensate an FBI task force officer -- first with a promise of cases of beer and then with $100 in cash -- for illegally obtaining text messages from a cell phone carrier between two numbers Jones provided.
Jones and the agent allegedly engaged in a series of back-and-forth conversations including text messages and at least one face to face meeting Oct. 10 through Nov. 3.
On that date, Jones and the FBI officer again met and exchanged the text messages -- supposedly contained on an FBI disk obtained from the FBI officer's federal computer -- for the $100 in cash.
Jones was arrested soon afterward.
Don Connelly, public information officer for the U.S. Attorney's Office, Eastern District, N.C., said that he sat in on the proceeding during Jones' first appearance in federal court in Raleigh Wednesday. He said that Jones announced his intentions then to retain his own counsel and to plead not guilty, none of which will impact the federal government as it goes ahead with its prosecution.
"Generally speaking, an indictment is not sought unless (the government) is pretty certain we have enough evidence to seek a conviction," Connelly said.
Connelly declined to go into detail describing what type of evidence the government has -- either written or recorded -- against Jones.
Barfield said no evidence against his client has been disclosed to him at this point.
"We don't have anything other than the indictment yet," he said.
If convicted, Jones could face substantial jail time and hefty fines. In the interim, Jones' judicial calendar has been taken over by a judge from a neighboring county.
Any administrative action against Jones would take place only after the investigation and prosecution against him are concluded, N.C. Administrative Office of the Courts Communications Director Sharon Gladwell said.
"If disciplinary action is needed, the process will be managed by the N.C. Judicial Standards Commission," she said.