The Mississippi Supreme Court has ordered a man convicted in a timber theft scheme in Jeff Davis County to be resentenced to just one conspiracy charge instead of two.
The state’s high court handed down the ruling regarding Robert Patrick Terrell, 37, on Jan. 4.
The opinion summarized the case as follows:
“In 2011, Robert Patrick Terrell — through his middleman Archie Nicholson — recruited Ricardo L. Hawthorne to record forged property deeds purporting to convey John McLendon’s property to Hawthorne. Terrell and his coconspirators then used the forged deeds to fraudulently induce a timber company to buy the timber rights for $20,300 and, unbeknownst to McLendon, harvest his timber. A jury found Terrell guilty of timber theft, conspiracy to commit timber theft, false pretenses, and conspiracy to commit false pretenses.”
The Supreme Court confirmed his conviction on two of the charges: timber theft and false pretenses. But it said there was only one conspiracy, not two. It vacated those two conspiracy sentences and remanded them to the trial court to dismiss one of the counts and resentence Terrell on the remaining count.
“The evidence shows there were not two separate conspiracies but rather one conspiracy with two illegal objects — to steal McLendon’s timber and to obtain $20,300 from Brushy Creek through false pretenses,” the opinion said. “Thus, Terrell’s two, five-year sentences for conspiracy to commit false pretenses and conspiracy to commit timber theft punish him twice for the same illegal agreement, violating the constitutional prohibition against double jeopardy.”
He is currently serving 25 years at the Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman and was also ordered to pay $122,921 in fines and restitution.
This was not the first time Terrell had been involved in questionable timber deals. The Supreme Court referenced two other judgments against him: “a 2012 order granting summary judgment to several plaintiffs who had sued Terrell and his timber company for forging deeds with their signatures and causing them more than $10,000 in damages. The other was a 2009 judgment ordering Terrell to pay $40,000 for wrongfully cutting timber from 100 acres of land in Jefferson County belonging to someone else.”
The Supreme Court’s vote was 6-3. The three dissenting justices argued there was not enough evidence to convict Terrell of timber theft and that the judge shouldn’t have allowed the previous civil judgments against Terrell to be admitted at the trial. They wanted to reverse the convictions and remand all of them for a new trial.
