Manson back in court over squalid property at center of family’s rape cases

Steven L. Manson appeared in Marion County District Court on June 1 to answer environmental charges over the condition of his Yellville property, but the case was continued to Aug. 3 after no attorney entered an appearance on his behalf. District Judge Jodi Carney granted the continuance and warned Manson that his attorney, Eugene Clifford,…

ByChris FultonJune 2, 20260Comments

Crime Events Feature Government Health News Opinion

Commentary: Welcoming a son, continuing a fight

Today's edition of the Mountain Home Observer will be the last regular edition for a couple of weeks. Thursday or Friday, my wife and I expect to welcome our son into the world via a scheduled induction. I'm stepping away from the newsroom to put on my dad hat full-time. Our household needs time to…

ByChris FultonApril 8, 20260Comments

Events Feature Government News People

Arkansas lawmakers killed child welfare reforms designed to prevent cases like the ones in Baxter and Marion County

In Marion County, mandated reporters told the state about a 10-year-old girl living in dangerous conditions on County Road 8054. The Department of Human Services knew. The child was sexually abused. In Baxter County, 29 reports to the child abuse hotline over 11 years described a boy being locked in a bathroom, starved and tortured.…

ByChris FultonApril 7, 20260Comments

Crime Events Feature Government News People

One sex offender removed from registry, another ignored: How the 14th Judicial District is handling its most serious cases

On May 22, 2025, Circuit Judge Johnnie A. Copeland signed an order removing John Laubenstein from the Arkansas Sex Offender Registry. Laubenstein had been convicted in 1984 in San Joaquin County, California, on two counts of lewd or lascivious acts on a child under 14 and one count of oral copulation with a victim under…

ByChris FultonApril 3, 20260Comments

Crime Events Feature Government News People

She wanted to be a nurse. At 19, she is charged with rape.

How a registered sex offender groomed his stepdaughter from a girl with college dreams into a co-defendant, and why no one stopped it Dezarea Kennedy wanted to be a nurse. Her grandmother still has pictures all over the house. A girl who went to concerts with her aunt, went kayaking the next day, talked about…

ByChris FultonMarch 26, 20260Comments

Crime Feature Government News People

They knew: Sheriff’s reports document months of abuse, threats and calls for help before child was raped on Marion County road

Before Steven Michael Manson Jr. was charged with raping a child on or about Nov. 20, 2025, the Marion County Sheriff's Office had already been called to his road dozens of times. Deputies had already documented threats to kill neighbors. They had already seen animals in squalor. They had already encountered a young girl being…

ByChris FultonMarch 25, 20260Comments

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