Damage to memorial not extensive

A Springdale man who was arrested June 24 after attacking the Carroll County Veterans Memorial on the downtown square in Berryville with a hammer recently underwent a court-ordered mental evaluation.

Dustin Doak

Dustin C. Doak, 37, of Springdale, was arrested by Berryville Police and charged with felony criminal mischief and disorderly conduct.

According to court records, Doak was diagnosed as suffering from untreated schizophrenia. He also has a history of attacking veterans memorials.

In September 2021, Doak was arrested after confessing to vandalizing the World War veterans memorial “Doughboy Statue” in Eureka Springs’ Basin Spring Park, damaging the nose, forehead and the top part of the helmet.

After the Berryville incident, Doak reportedly told officers he attacked the memorial because all the names listed on it were fake. In the Eureka Springs incident — which carried a charge of “defacing an object of publicrespect” — he told officers he felt compelled to attack the statue because it was a “false idol” and had “a bomb inside.”

Berryville Police Chief Robert Bartos said Doak “consented to the arrest” once officers arrived on the scene.

“It was during the day that we got the call,” Bartos said. “Some of the people, the business owners, had called and said there was guy upthere with a hammer and he was kind of hammering away on the monument.”

Court records show that Doak had missed several appointments for a mental evaluation in the previous case before finally being transported by Carroll County Sheriff’s deputies on June 30.

Despite the Springdale address listed for Doak, Bartos described him as “homeless” and familiar to police in bothEureka Springs and Berryville.

“He just kind of roams the streets between here and Eureka,” Bartos said. “We’ve had a few incidents with him.”

The Berryville memorialsuffered much less damage than the statue in Eureka Springs, and Berryville Mayor Tim McKinney told the city council during its meeting on Aug. 2 that the damage should be easy to repair.

“The guy called and he’dlooked at it, but we haven’t actually got it repaired, but he thought he could get it,” McKinney said. “There wasn’t any lettering or anything damaged, so he thought he could by putting some new bevels on it and everything.”