The Arkansas Supreme Court on Friday said Circuit Judge Jodi Raines Dennis was correct when she dismissed petitions filed by a prison inmate who claimed his conviction in three separate trials for rape violated the prohibition against double jeopardy.
Jackie L. Williams, 53, was convicted of rape in Pulaski County but filed the petition in Jefferson Count because he is locked up in a prison in the county.
According to the court documents, Williams raped three women in 1994 and was charged with three separate counts of rape, and each of the three counts was tried separately. He was convicted of one count and sentenced as an habitual offender to 25 years or 300 months in prison. A conviction on a second count by a second jury resulted in a sentence of life in prison and a third jury convicted him of the final count and he was sentenced to life imprisonment as an habitual offender. The jury in that case also ruled that Williams would serve his sentences consecutively.
Williams filed three separate appeals which Dennis rejected then he appealed her ruling to the Supreme Court. In the appeal, he contended that he was charged with the three rapes under the same docket number, but the Supreme Court said the charges were separated and the three separate trials were proper.
Supreme Court justice Shawn Womack said Williams had raised the same objections in the multiple appeals without adding additional information to support the objections and his latest appeal is an abuse of the court system.
