CLINTON — A former city attorney of this small north-central Arkansas town died early Friday after being punched during a scuffle outside a restaurant he owned.
Brett Blakney, 43, was punched about 10 p.m. Thursday by a patron who earlier this year had been banned from the Black Dog Grill, according to a Clinton Police Department report.
The report said Blakney fell to the ground and hit his head. He was transported to the Ozark Health Medical Center in Clinton, where he died about 4 a.m. Friday.
Officials with the Van Buren sheriff’s office and the Arkansas State Police said they had identified a suspect who fought with Blakney and he was being sought Friday afternoon. The police report identified the suspect as Rosendo Meek, 27, of Clinton.
“This individual was trying to enter the grill and there was a fight … and there was one blow to the face of Blakney, who fell to the ground and was at the grill for a while before going to the hospital,” state police spokesman Bill Sadler said.
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The report also said that the suspect had been arrested for public intoxication at the club in January and that Blakney had said he was no longer allowed in the establishment.
Blakney, who had a law practice in Clinton, purchased the restaurant last fall. He previously worked as a reporter and photographer for the Van Buren County Democrat.
According to the police report, officers interviewed Blakney after he was transported to the hospital by ambulance.
The report said Blakney picked the suspect out of a photo lineup and said he was positive it was the person who had hit him.
“I told Blakney I would get a statement from him the following day when he felt better and he would go to the prosecutor for a warrant,” Officer Eric Koonce wrote in the report.
Koonce also wrote that after he spoke with Blakney, he and other officers outside the hospital emergency room noticed some of the nursing staff upset because they couldn’t get a helicopter to fly Blakney to Little Rock for treatment.
The nurses said the local ambulance company, Southern Paramedics, could not transport because it had just one ambulance in the county at that time and could not leave the county unattended, the report said.
A nurse later walked by the officers and “stated ‘if he’s not transported, he’s going to lay here with that head injury and bleed to death,’” Koonce wrote.
Koonce wrote that he went back to the police station to begin writing the report and he received a call about 4 a.m. that Blakney had died.
Adam Holt, spokesman for hospital, referred all questions about the incident to the Clinton Police Department. He said the hospital also was “conducting a routine analysis as we do anytime anything of this nature occurs.”
“We may be able to release further information at a later time,” he said. “We do extend our deepest sympathies in the loss of this prominent member of our community.”
Gary Padget, CEO of Southern Paramedics, said a dispatcher for the ambulance service asked about the availability of a helicopter to transport Blakney to Little Rock but was told it was not available because of fog.
He said a Southern Paramedics ambulance already en route to Arkansas Children’s Hospital in Little Rock, met another Southern Paramedics ambulance in Conway, where the patient was transferred and the ambulance returned to Clinton to pick up Blakney.
“The unit at Ozark Health was released to leave between 1:30 and 1:45 a.m.,” Padget said Friday afternoon, adding he was trying to determine why the ambulance failed to take Blakney to Little Rock at that time.
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Anita Tucker writes for the Van Buren County Democrat. Rob Moritz of the Arkansas News Bureau contributed to this report.