GUILTY AR - Bob & Jerrod Castleman for mailing copperhead snake to foe, Pocahontas, 2002

LP Moderator said:

When I saw the titled of your thread, I thought you were going to tell us he mailed himself! LOL

:crazy: :crazy:

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Good things come in small packages ~ she has had an uphill battle her whole like, she is very frank about discussing it - it was interesting when she told me many times she is not taken seriously (at first) in the court room but by the end of the day she is taller than anyone inthe room -

She is an amazing woman although the people I took to court may think she is a snake....

I however, am forever in her debt.

The snake had been mailed in a cardboard box filled with green packing peanuts, and it was Staton's wife who opened it while sitting in the front seat of their car. It "popped out" facing her, she said, and she threw it out of the vehicle onto the ground, trapping it under the box. Sheriff's deputies rushed to the scene and shot the snake, which was then preserved in an ethanol jar by a snake pathologist. The jar would later turn up during the trial, where it was held up in front of the jurors, so they could get a clear look...

Castleman went on to deliver an extended monologue at the sentencing hearing in 2004. "I made the mistake of taking the law into my own hands," he concluded. Judge George Howard Jr., heard his apology and was moved. "Once a sinner, not always a sinner," Howard proclaimed gravely. "I'm a strong believer in that scriptural concept." Castleman was disbarred and sentenced to 27 months in prison. However, the judge said in closing, "I'm persuaded that you have seen the light."

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The first raid on Pocahontas came a month after the meth lab was discovered on Castleman's farm, in May 2011. A tactical meeting was called at 5 a.m. May 9 at the Arkansas State Police's Company F headquarters in Jonesboro. None of the officers had been briefed on the day's assignment beforehand. The FBI headed the operation, and other departments were also in attendance, though the Pocahontas Police Department was conspicuously absent. It soon emerged that the city's police force was kept in the dark because it was among the targets of the investigation.

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