Original publication date :	Thursday, May 19, 1994
Delivery date :	Wednesday, August 31, 2005 9:40:09 am
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Image: Photo by Steve Keesee, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
   LEASURE TRIAL BEGINS -- Pulaski County Circuit Court bailiff Bill
   Johnson directs Bruce Leasure toward the courtroom where the former
   Little Rock pharmacist's trial for burglary and attempted arson began
   Wednesday.
   LEASURE `SNAPPED,' DEFENSE CONTENDS
   Days after his pharmacy was inspected by the state Board of Pharmacy in response to complaints, pharmacist Bruce Leasure broke in and tried to set fire to a pharmacy co-owned by the board's director, prosecutors charged Wednesday.
   Leasure, 39, went on trial Wednesday in Pulaski County Circuit Court on burglary and attempted arson charges in the July 5, 1993, incident at City Pharmacy, 18th Street and Broadway.
   Leasure's attorney, Morgan "Chip" Welch, didn't dispute the charges leveled by Deputy Prosecuting Attorney W.A. McCormick, but said his client wasn't motivated by revenge.
   Instead, Welch told a jury of seven women and five men, his client had "finally snapped" after a series of events beginning a year earlier when Leasure shot and killed a man he said had just robbed his pharmacy.
   Prosecuting Attorney Mark Stodola determined the shooting was justified. But Welch cited a civil suit and alleged threats from the man's family after the incident as the beginning of a downward spiral that ended with Leasure suffering a nervous breakdown. A civil suit by the family of Stephen Cole, 40, is pending in another court.
   "Bruce realized that killing a human being is one of the most traumatic things that could happen to anybody," Welch said.
   In the year after the April 27, 1992, shooting, Welch said, Leasure lost his wife and daughter in a divorce; began having business troubles when a partner backed out and demanded $100,000, leaving him broke; began seeing a psychiatrist and taking anti-depressants, which confused him; suffered a concussion in a car accident, which also left him without a car; and got out of debt only to get back in.
   Welch said that in the days before the incident, a repairman broke the pharmacy's computer, causing problems that prompted the Pharmacy Board audit. He said Leasure was visited by a member of Cole's family, and on the Fourth of July had an argument with his wife, during which she forbade him to see his daughter that night.
   Later that night is when the crime occurred, Welch said.
   He said that the next day, Leasure offered to pay for the damage -- which amounted to $300 -- but board Director Lester Hosto refused the money. Hosto agreed with that Wednesday when he took the stand as the state's first witness.
   The trial, presided over by Special Judge Bill McArthur, is expected to last through Friday or Monday.
   Leasure pleaded innocent by reason of mental disease or defect. Welch said psychiatrists for the defense will refute state psychiatrists' contention that Leasure was mentally competent.
   As further proof of Leasure's mental illness, Welch cited Leasure's highly publicized foray to Nevada in October 1993, which ended in his bond being revoked. Authorities there said they found him looking for a Marine Corps recruiter after he wandered, confused, in the desert.
   Leasure sat at the defense table Wednesday in an orange jumpsuit from the Pulaski County Jail. Defendants usually attend their trials in street clothes, but Welch said his client is penniless and has no other clothes, adding that Leasure also no longer has a home.
   McCormick said Leasure may have had "personal problems," but told jurors to consider Leasure's educational background and his familiarity with the effects anti-depressants have when considering his defense.
   He said the Pharmacy Board was "scheduled to have investigators come to his business after July Fourth."
   Hosto testified that an inspector found improper record keeping and Leasure seemed "relieved" during a July 1 conversation that "we decided we would have an inspector help him get everything straightened out."

This story was published Thursday, May 19, 1994