Jake C. Files (born March 27, 1972) is a Republican politician from

Fort Smith, Arkansas Fort Smith is the List of municipalities in Arkansas, third-most populous city in Arkansas, United States, and one of the two county seats of Sebastian County, Arkansas, Sebastian County. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the pop ...

. Files represented portions of the Arkansas River Valley in the Arkansas House of Representatives from 1999 to 2003, and in the

Arkansas Senate The Arkansas State Senate is the upper branch of the Arkansas General Assembly. The Senate consists of 35 members, each representing a district with about 83,000 people. Service in the state legislature is part-time, and many state senators have ...

from 2011 to 2018. He pleaded guilty in 2018 to wire fraud, bank fraud and money laundering relating to misuse of the state's surplus money and was sentenced to 18 months in prison.

Background

A native of Norman,

Oklahoma Oklahoma ( ; Choctaw language, Choctaw: , ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Texas to the south and west, Kansas to the north, Missouri to the northea ...

, Files graduated cum laude with a

bachelor's degree A bachelor's degree (from Medieval Latin ''baccalaureus'') or baccalaureate (from Modern Latin ''baccalaureatus'') is an undergraduate degree awarded by colleges and universities upon completion of a course of study lasting three to six years ...

accounting Accounting, also known as accountancy, is the process of recording and processing information about economic entity, economic entities, such as businesses and corporations. Accounting measures the results of an organization's economic activit ...

from Arkansas State University in Jonesboro. Previously, he attended Ouachita Baptist University in Arkadelphia. He owns FFH Construction, a general construction firm. From 1997 to 2004, he was the president and superintendent of the Fort Smith Christian School. Prior to that, he was hired to help start operations of the Baldor Electric Company plant in Ozark, Arkansas, as the accountant and materials manager. He and his wife, the former Michaela K. Mitchell (born 1977), have four children. The senator coaches Little League

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball sport played between two team sport, teams of nine players each, taking turns batting (baseball), batting and Fielding (baseball), fielding. The game occurs over the course of several Pitch ...

and

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appro ...

Political life

From 1999 to 2003, he represented District 12 in the Arkansas House of Representatives. Files was first elected to the State Senate in 2010 in District 13. His district number was switched through redistricting from District 13 to District 8, effective January 2013. His district boundaries changed to include most of the cities of Greenwood and Hackett. He served on Senate committees for Revenue & Taxation, Transportation, Technology, Legislative Affairs, Joint Budget, and Senate Efficiency. He was also a member of the Joint (House and Senate) Legislative Committee on Auditing. He was chairman of the Revenue and Taxation Committee.

Fraud scandal

In early 2017, Files was accused of submitting false bids for the River Valley Sports Complex, a planned park of softball fields at Chaffee Crossing in Fort Smith. Though initially denying the charges, Files pleaded guilty to wire fraud, bank fraud and money laundering in the United States District Court for the Western District of Arkansas in January 2018. He resigned his senate seat in February.

Plea

The plea agreement says Files and Lee Webb, a member of the Sebastian County Election Commission, convinced the City of Fort Smith to appropriate $1.6 million for the project in 2014. Files then created three fictitious companies to bid for the project. He later proposed steering $150,000 of public funds from the state's General Improvement Fund (GIF) to the project. Files had control over the funds, and was chairman of the Senate Revenue and Taxation Committee. He pleaded guilty, and was sentenced to 18 months in prison and ordered to pay $83,900 in restitution.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Files, Jake 1972 births Living people 21st-century American criminals American fraudsters American people convicted of money laundering Arkansas politicians convicted of crimes Ouachita Baptist University alumni Arkansas State University alumni Republican Party members of the Arkansas House of Representatives 21st-century members of the Arkansas General Assembly Republican Party Arkansas state senators Tea Party movement activists People from Norman, Oklahoma Politicians from Fort Smith, Arkansas Businesspeople from Arkansas American accountants American educators Baptists from Arkansas Baptists from Oklahoma