West Helena man booked on arson, terroristic-threat charges in Phillips County

Phillips County jail records show West Helena resident Darius Hairl was booked at 10:38 a.m. May 28 on charges of arson and making a terrorist threat, a combination that can signal danger to people, property, and first responders.

Hairl, 34, is listed in the Phillips County Sheriff’s Office inmate roster under booking number 26-0031. The public entry identifies the charges but does not say whether the alleged arson involved a home, a business, or a public place in West Helena or elsewhere in Phillips County.

That missing detail matters for residents trying to gauge the reach of the case. The roster does not list the amount of damage, any named victim, or whether the threat was tied to a specific location. It also does not show whether Hairl had already appeared before a judge by the time the booking was posted.

Under Arkansas law, first-degree terroristic threatening is a Class D felony. State law defines it as threatening death, serious physical injury, or substantial property damage with the purpose of terrorizing another person. Arson penalties vary with the alleged damage amount, ranging from a Class A misdemeanor when damage is under $500 to a Class Y felony when damage is at least $100,000.

The sheriff’s office online inmate system gives Phillips County residents a way to track those developments without calling the jail for every update. Its current inmate roster lists people being held at the Phillips County Detention Center, and a separate 48-hour release page shows people released within the previous two days.

Sheriff Neal Byrd’s office says he has served since Jan. 1, 2013, and the department says Phillips County was formed on May 1, 1820. Those details reflect the long institutional footprint behind the county’s detention records, which remain one of the quickest public windows into local criminal-justice activity.

For now, the booking places a serious allegation into the public record, but it does not establish guilt. The immediate public-safety question is narrower and more concrete: the roster shows that someone was arrested on charges tied to fire and threat, but it does not say that any Phillips County home, business, or public site was actually damaged or targeted.