Continuing Legal Education

      The First Judicial Circuit sponsors a CLE program each year, held on the third or fourth Friday in November. The program offers six (6) hours of CLE, consisting of five (5) general hours and one (1) hour of Ethics. The program is open to all attorneys and anyone else who may need professional CLE hours. The program is informative, informal, and reasonably priced. The fall, 2016, CLE program will be held at the East Arkansas Community College on Friday, November 18, 2016.  Registration begins at 8:15 a.m. through 9:00 a.m. 

     If you would like more information regarding this year's CLE program, please contact Judge Christopher Morledge at Post Office Box 1225, Forrest City, Arkansas,  72336; 870-261-1740. 

     The Arkansas Supreme Court first mandated, in 1989, that each practicing attorney, holding an Arkansas law license, receive twelve (12) hours of Continuing Legal Education each year. The First Judicial Circuit CLE program has received Arkansas Supreme Court CLE certification each year since the inception of mandatory CLE. Our seminar began long before CLE was required in Arkansas. Chancellor Richard McCulloch of Forrest City and Chancellor George Cracraft of Helena inaugurated this program in 1974 with local attorneys gathering for a session of updating their skills and expertise through the Socratic Method. Judge John Pittman first secured CLE certification for the First Judicial Circuit in 1989. The program has received Arkansas CLE approval each year since then. We believe it is one of the longest running CLE approved programs in the State of Arkansas.

     For the past several years, the First Judicial Circuit has sponsored a spring/summer six-hour CLE program in the Bahamas, Washington, D.C., Hot Springs, Arkansas, and on a Carribean Cruise ship.