Before admitting to an extramarital affair with his chief deputy, Pulaski County Prosecuting Attorney Will Jones went on 11 overnight training trips with her at taxpayer expense.
On a July 2024 junket, Jones sat side-by-side with Kelly Ward on flights to and from Boise, Idaho, arriving at the Riverside Hotel more than 14 hours before a colleague checked in for the same event. Ward and Jones booked rooms 507 and 508, side-by-side on the hotel’s main level, while another prosecutor from their office stayed in a room on a separate level.
Ward paid for the plane tickets and the rooms for that trip, writing in an email seeking reimbursement that she’d sent the “receipt for mine and Will’s airline tickets.”
They traveled on other occasions to Nashville, Tenn.; St. Louis; Kansas City, Mo.; and Jackson, Mich. Uncovered by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette in a review of nearly three years of travel records, the trips began April 21, 2023, and cost taxpayers $17,108.
On the last trip, Oct. 21-23, Jones traveled to the Wyndham in Fort Smith for a prosecuting attorneys conference. Ward also attended but didn’t seek reimbursement for a hotel room.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
Her husband, Seth, has said in a statement Jones’ wife caught the lovers on that trip when the top prosecutor “forgot to hang up the phone in my wife’s hotel room on October 23.”
Neither Jones nor Kelly Ward would talk about the details of their affair, including when it began. Seth Ward filed for divorce in December after 24 years of marriage. Jones has said he is working to reconcile with his wife, North Little Rock District Judge Paula Juels Jones, 53. He is seeking re-election. Kelly Ward resigned as chief deputy to take a lower-paying job as a public defender.
Both Will Jones and Ward said their romance impacted neither their work nor taxpayer money.
“I take the responsibility of taxpayers’ money very seriously and I would never misuse it,” Jones said.
According to records obtained from the prosecutor’s office, Pulaski County and the Arkansas Department of Finance and Administration:
• The trip to Boise cost taxpayers $4,669 for travel, lodging and registration at the National District Attorneys Association summer summit.
• In the preceding month, from June 9-11, 2024, Jones and Ward flew together for a three-day trip to Jackson, Michigan, to meet with organizers of the Group Violence Intervention program. Ward paid for the plane tickets and was reimbursed. That trip cost taxpayers $1,322 for travel and registration.
• From July 10-11, 2023, Jones and Ward attended the National District Attorneys Association summer summit in Nashville. Ward’s hotel bill included valet parking. Jones’ did not. That trip cost taxpayers $3,174 for travel, lodging and registration.
• A two-day July 2025 jaunt to Kansas City for another national district attorneys summit cost $2,248 for registration and lodging.
• Jones and Ward booked adjoining rooms at the Sonesta hotel in January 2025 for a three-day training trip to the Regional Organized Crime Information Center in Nashville. Jones and Ward checked in Jan. 26, 2025, the day before the conference, and checked out Jan. 29, 2025. Their rooms cost taxpayers $908.
Jones, Ward hotel receipt
In 2024, Kelly Ward, the chief deputy in the Pulaski County Prosecutor’s Office, booked hotel reservations (shown above) to a legal convention in Boise, Idaho, for her and Prosecutor Will Jones, where they arrived more than 14 hours before a colleague checked in for the same event. The reservations for the two were for rooms 507 and 508, side by side on the hotel’s main level, while the other prosecutor from their office stayed in a room on a separate level.
[Click here to read documents.]
Other prosecutors and staff attended some of the same events. Jones and Ward regularly traveled together, according to the records.
The prosecutor’s office has budgeted $52,000 to $60,000 annually for training since Jones took office in 2023, Jones said. That amount, he said, was established by his predecessor, Larry Jegley, who retired in 2022 after 26 years in office.
Records show the prosecutor’s office paid $57,404 for another 24 educational trips by some of the more than 40 deputies under Jones’ watch. He said the training programs help satisfy the requirement that all Arkansas lawyers receive at least 12 hours of continuing legal education every year.
Deputies have been sent to New Orleans; Anaheim, Calif.; Charleston, S.C; Milwaukee; Philadelphia; St. Paul, Minn.; and Tulsa.
Jones said he and Ward attended management training programs to learn about supervising and managing a large prosecution office. They also trained on the prosecution’s new document and case management computer system.
“The leadership conferences, we felt it was important for us to go because we’re new to running an office full of attorneys and staff, so we knew those would be valuable training sources for us,” Jones said.
In Boise, Ward said, they learned how to develop a social media strategy for using Facebook and Instagram to more directly connect with the public.
Jones, 50, disclosed the affair in a Nov. 17 television interview. He said he and Ward ended the romance when his wife learned of it.
Ward resigned four days after Jones’ TV appearance. She made $153,629 a year in the prosecutor’s office. She now works as a public defender in Fayetteville for $119,882 a year.
Jones is paid $200,097 annually. He is being challenged in the prosecutor’s race by defense attorney and restaurateur Bobby Forrest Jr., 34, of Sherwood.
Seth Ward said his wife called him the same day she and Jones were discovered. He said he thought his wife and Jones traveled a lot together, but he never suspected an affair. The trio had been friends since attending law school together. Seth Ward said he’s never heard from Jones.
“There are not many jobs where integrity matters as much as it does in that one,” Ward said, “and there are not many people with less integrity than Will Jones, who has yet to apologize.”