JONESBORO, Ark. — Hundreds of pages of files have been released as part of records requests on Judge-elect Doug Brimhall’s felony arrest back in May. Much remains redacted due to the involvement of juveniles. Even some details not redacted would be dubious to republish, as some in law enforcement believe they were released by the defense to ‘shame the victim’ for conduct not relevant to events that evening.
NEA Report did our best to review the files and bring you the important details. Some of that requires us to tell the story again from the beginning.
Brimhall was born and raised in Jonesboro, as stated in an article from the Jonesboro Sun. He graduated from Jonesboro High School in 2002. In 2006, Douglas Brimhall received his Bachelor of Arts in Criminal Justice from the University of Arkansas. Later, he received his Juris Doctor in 2009. In 2010, he established Brimhall Law Firm. He began working as a deputy prosecuting attorney, too.
In March 2024, Brimhall won a special election for circuit judge, district 2, division 4, 12,731 to 11,391 for his opponent, Curtis Walker Jr.
He was set to take the bench in 2025 until one wild night, fueled by alcohol, changed everything.
On May 3, 2024, the wild night in question happened. According to the probable cause affidavit, police were told that night, Brimhall arrived back from the Jonesboro Country Club intoxicated, or “drunk drunk” as one young witness described. He entered the room with his wife, but exited a short time later, only wearing his underwear, the PC affidavit said. He then walked into his daughter’s room, the juvenile victim in this case. He lay in the bed next to his daughter while attempting to wake her up. The juvenile became angry at him and a verbal altercation happened. Brimhall berated her, dumped a water bottle on her head, and left the room. According to the incident report, the victim said he called her a “fuc*ing bitch over and over.”
Doug’s current wife, Brittany, came into the room of the juvenile victim. She held her while she was crying, the incident report said. They left with another juvenile, identified as a witness, and went to the grandfather’s house. A third juvenile left in her own vehicle.
Later, Brimhall’s wife reviewed home security cameras, and not seeing anything out of the ordinary, decided to return home. But Brimhall was still outside, and still in his underwear. The family decided Brimhall needed to be helped back inside of the house. As Brittany returned, Brimhall jumped onto the front of the vehicle and broke the front windshield. The passenger, a juvenile witness, was scared by this. It led to the juvenile victim getting out of the vehicle, shouting at Brimhall. She throws a drink at Brimhall, and a physical altercation ensues.
The victim said Brimhall grabbed her by the arms and pushed her into the yard. She said he placed his right arm on her arm and his left hand around her neck, choking her. The incident report alleges Brimhall said he was going to ‘fu*k her up.’ While being choked, the victim stated she could barely breathe and at one point, could not breathe at all. She said she began hitting him to get him off of her. Both she and Brimhall fell to the ground during this, and Brimhall got on top of the victim. Brimhall’s wife told the judge-elect to get off of his daughter and go inside, which he did.
Brimhall claimed he was going to give his daughter a “noogie” but the victim received multiple scrapes and bruises across her wrists and arms. Officers noted redness around the victim’s neck. When asked how drunk he was, Brimhall reportedly said, “I don’t know. Too much or not too much, I couldn’t tell you.”
The Ex-Wife
The ex-wife told police this is what the juvenile victim explained happened to her.After the confrontation, the juvenile victim went to the home of Lark Montgomery, the ex-wife of Brimhall. She is not the biological mother of the victim. Notes from the prosecutor say the biological mother is ‘not in the picture.’ The incident report states Montgomery is also a mandated reporter.
On May 4, JPD first learned of what happened. Montgomery made the report after her sister, a lawyer, told her it needed to be reported to the child abuse hotline. Montgomery said Brimhall told her not to contact the hotline.
The next day, Montgomery told police she took the victim to Brimhall’s parents’ house to tell them what happened. In the incident report, Montgomery said the parents made excuses, saying, “Well you know alcohol was involved.” The juvenile victim responded that it was no excuse. The parents also said they had been at the lake and when they returned to Jonesboro, they could not find Brimhall for almost 2 and a half hours. Eventually, they found him at Kum and Go on Hilltop. The parents reportedly said they were attempting to convince Brimhall to get some help and speak with someone. They said he even made statements about hurting himself.
Montgomery said this was the first time Brimhall had become physical with the victim, but he had been loud and broken things before. She said he found a picture on social media of the victim with a boy standing next to her and became outraged, went into her room, tore the television off the wall, and slammed it into the ground. Another time, he became angry and took a hammer to the victim’s cell phone. Montgomery said the anger appears to be directed only at the victim and not his other children.
It was around this time law enforcement began to realize they were investigating a serious case. May 3 was a Friday and with it being a weekend, a few days passed before there were any new interviews. But by Monday, the activity in the investigation was ramping back up.
On May 6, Prosecutor Sonia F. Hagood signed a motion for the appointment of special counsel. Because of all of Brimhall’s previous relationships with judges and other prosecutors, Special Judge Robert Edwards was appointed to preside over the case, with Special Prosecutor Robbie Jones being assigned to represent the state.
On May 7, Brimhall resigned as deputy prosecuting attorney, working under Hagood. In a letter dated, October 4, Hagood wrote it was to her “great relief” that he resigned that day.
On the same day, authorities got their first glimpse into how Brimhall and those close to him were treating the incident.
The Wife
On May 7, police interviewed Brittany Brimhall, who said two juveniles were awake in the home when she and Doug returned. The victim was asleep. Police noted at this point in the interview, Brittany made a quick remark about the victim’s mental health issues before explaining that if you wake her up, she gets mad and if you don’t, she gets mad, the report said. Brittany heard the juvenile victim asking, “Why are you waking me up?” and also heard Doug reply with “some choice words.” Brittany said Doug yelled, “I’m tired of this shit and I’m tired of the way you treat me.” Brittany then gathered the children and got them out of the home. She said it was to “keep the casualties low” and due to the yelling/words being said.
When they arrived back, Brittany said Doug was out by the mailbox and “acting goofy.” He jumped on the car and his elbow cracked the front windshield. Brittany said it was funny until the windshield cracked and scared one of the other juveniles. She stated the juvenile victim was holding a large soda and threw it in the face of Doug, who she said replied “Fu*k you are” or “fu*k no” or something with the F-word.
Doug grabbed the juvenile victim, but Brittany describes this as normal, due to them doing it in the kitchen “24/7.” They stumble and fall in the yard. Doug gets on top and Brittany pulls her vehicle into the driveway. She then said she exited the vehicle and told Doug, “That’s enough” and to get inside.
Brittany is asked by police what her interpretation of the entire incident was. At this point in the interview, she appears to blame the juvenile victim by going into a detailed explanation of how the juvenile is troubled. Part of the issues came from finding a burner phone belonging to the victim that had explicit photos on it. The descriptions are extremely graphic. The general theme of the conversation is how volatile the victim is. She also said the victim likes attention.
Brittany states she never saw Doug’s hands around the victim’s throat. She describes the hold he had her in more as a bear hug to de-escalate the situation. She described an incident where they were physical in the kitchen.
The detective showed Brittany photos of the injuries to the victim. After showing her, she responded that Doug also had taken photographs of his injuries.
The Victim
On May 7, authorities spoke with the underage victim in the case. Much of the report involving the victim is entirely redacted. Police noted she was embarrassed and upset at having to show her injuries. Police observed bruising on her right wrist, and upper left and right biceps areas that wrapped around to the back of her arm.
The juvenile victim said one of the juvenile witnesses told her Doug had come home intoxicated and was acting strangely. After a while, he came into her room and lay in her bed. She said she tried to ignore him but he poked her in her shoulder. She said she didn’t want him messing with her, and he threw water on her face as well as cursing her. She said Brittany had to pull him away and stop the assault. Then, they left the house for the first time.
When they later returned, the juvenile victim said Doug was hiding behind a mailbox in the front yard and jumped on the hood of the car as they pulled back up. That’s when the windshield was broken. Police noted being unclear about what happened next but the officer wrote he thought it involved the choking incident, “where she was picked up off of the ground by her throat and either dropped or thrown to the ground.” She acknowledged she had thrown a drink at him but claimed it was to try to keep him back.
The Judge-Elect
On May 13, Brimhall finally sat down with investigators to discuss the case. He first offered a “back story” which seemed to center around how his daughter was troubled. He said he had full custody of the victim for about 14 years. He described that she had been in counseling for six or seven years and that everything came to a head in February 2023, when the daughter went to a friend’s house where there were no parents present. There were boys and alcohol, though, and videos and pictures with explicit content were found.
Brimhall said he started giving the victim more parameters and limited who she could hang out with. Things went well until she started dating a certain boy Brimhall did not like. A physical altercation between the victim and her boyfriend led Brimhall to mandate she not see the boy anymore. Brimhall later discovered a burner phone in the victim’s room containing more lewd photos and conversations that drove a wedge between her and her father, with her mentioning wanting to move out.
The interview then shifts to the night in question, May 3. Brimhall said he returned from the country club and went up the stairs to wake the victim, claiming he was still fully clothed. He laid down next to her in bed and said “Hey sweetie, I’m home.” The victim responded “Get off me.” and Brimhall then poured water on her. Brimhall told the detective “We always do that” and it “fires her up.” He apparently still viewed it as not a mistake. But, after ‘firing her up’ by dousing her in water, Brimhall recalled that he said he is tired of the victim “treating me like shit, you treating everyone like shit.” The victim and the other juveniles left the residence with Brimhall’s wife.
Brimhall said, while still in his boxers, he walked back outside when one of the juveniles pulled back up. After seeing him, she drove off. She returned with Brimhall’s wife and others. Brimhall hid behind a mailbox, squatting down and jumping out when they got closer to him. He made the statement that he is a jokester and wanted to jump on the car “like they hit me.” But when he jumped on the car, he cracked the windshield.
The juvenile victim and Brimhall engaged in another fight, with Brimhall saying she exited the vehicle shouting “You don’t fu*king talk to [redacted] that way.” She proceeded to throw a drink onto Brimhall before shoving and slapping him, he said, leading him to put her in a headlock and telling her to “stop or someone is going to get hurt.” Brimhall said they wrestled frequently and it was normal.
The two wrestled toward the grass and tripped on the curb, with Brimhall falling on his teenage daughter. He stated it probably “did hurt” to the detective. Once again, Brimhall’s current wife stopped the incident from going further and tells Doug to “get off of her and get inside.” Brimhall said he never grabbed her by the throat.
After telling the investigator this, Brimhall said he had done everything for her and even considered boarding school, at one point. The conversation then returned to the victim’s mental stability and resentment in the home. Brimhall said he didn’t know why his wife took the juveniles and left him in the home, but thought it was before someone said something they couldn’t take back. He did not appear to view himself as being the source of the issue.
Even though Brimhall admitted he had thrown a drink at his daughter while she was in bed, he described to detectives it was when his daughter threw a drink at him that the altercation became physical. When investigators asked if there was a catalyst that would have caused her to throw the drink, he did not answer the question.
On May 16, Judge Edwards signed a search warrant for security footage and tab/receipt information from the night of May 3 between 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. by Douglas or Brittany Brimhall at the Jonesboro Country Club.
On May 20, Jonesboro police requested an arrest warrant for Brimhall for aggravated assault on a family or household member, a Class D felony, and third-degree battery, a Class A misdemeanor. Judge Edwards set an “OR” bond on Brimhall, letting him go free minutes after he was booked on his charges. A no-contact order was issued between Brimhall and his daughter, the alleged victim. Brimhall was ordered not to use drugs or alcohol or to possess weapons, as well.
However, the case was far from over.
NEA Report reached out to Doug Brimhall through his legal team for comments but have not received a response as of this publication.
Most recently, Brimhall issued the following statement to KAIT on October 9:
“Thank you for reaching out to interview me. For months I have wanted to tell my story, all while reading the narratives of the misinformed, unled, or misguided. While I have wanted to tell my story, I have also wanted to protect my daughter, which is why I agreed to seal my legal team’s response to the filing of the State’s Motion in Limine, which included a detailed years-long timeline of the events leading up to the event.
I am thankful for the opportunity to be interviewed and be fully transparent to the public, however, that would require me to give personal and private details that would not be in my daughter’s best interest.
Therefore, while I appreciate the opportunity to share my side of the story, I will continue to make decisions based on the best interest of my family, and the chance for repair and reconciliation.”
– Doug Brimhall
Even though May 3 was at the center of the entire case, there were more allegations of callous and abusive behavior in the months that followed targeting the juvenile daughter/alleged victim in the case. There was also the father of other children in the home who sat down with Brimhall in the days after with his concerns.
In part two, we will explore those details, the conversations behind the plea agreement, and how the special prosecutor originally wanted Brimhall to be ineligible to serve as a judge as part of the arrangement, before changing his mind.
The Brimhall Files: Father of Witnesses Recounts Night as Prosecution Builds Case
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More criminals in power. Par for course. Congratulations Jonesboro, you played yourselves.