AR Times: “Federal Judge Kristine Baker last week set one of the long-awaited sentencing hearings for former Republican Sen. Jeremy Hutchinson, who’s pleaded guilty to federal crimes in three different jurisdictions.
One other former legislator — former Sen. Henry “Hank” Wilkins IV of Pine Bluff, who was charged, like Hutchinson, in the sprawling Preferred Family Healthcare bribery/kickback public corruption case, also is to learn his fate soon.
Wilkins will be sentenced at 1 p.m. Jan. 18 by Judge Brian Miller. Wilkins pleaded guilty in 2018 to conspiring to commit bribery. He admitted taking $80,000 in bribes, masked as contributions to a church he pastored, in return for steering nearly a quarter-millioin in state money to Medicaid-financed health care providers.
One other former legislator turned lobbyist, former Democratic Rep. Eddie Cooper of Melbourne, who has pleaded guilty to participating in the Preferred Family bribery/kickback scheme, has not yet been scheduled for sentencing. Hutchinson’s sentencing in that case also hasn’t been set.”