WALDRON -- The jury trial for the Scott County sheriff has been pushed back to 9:30 a.m. April 18 in the Scott County Circuit Court in Waldron, according to court records.
Randy Shores was set to go to trial March 13.
Emily White, a special prosecuting attorney for the 15th Judicial District, filed a motion to continue in the case Monday. Circuit Judge Jerry Ramey granted the continuance Tuesday.
Arkansas State Police arrested Shores, 62, on a warrant for two counts of accomplice to third-degree battery, a class A misdemeanor, Sept. 30. It was in connection with physical injury Omar Gonzalez caused when he was a Waldron police officer during the arrest of Robert Deer of Van Buren on Feb. 16, 2022. Gonzalez, 39, was arrested on a warrant for three counts of third-degree battery the same day.
Both men waived formal arraignment and pleaded not guilty to their charges in November, according to court records.
John Rhone, a special agent with Arkansas State Police, wrote in Shores' arrest affidavit Shores saw Gonzalez hit Deer on the head several times and sling him while handcuffed into the front of Deer's van headfirst, according to body camera videos Huntington and Mansfield police officers recorded at the scene.
Gonzalez entered a negotiated guilty plea to one count of third-degree battery Feb. 14, court records state. He was sentenced to pay a $1,000 fine and $250 in standard court costs. Gonzalez's remaining two charges were dismissed.