Probation granted in Lawrence County drug trafficking case

Jeff Lehr, The Joplin Globe, Mo.
·1 min read

May 18—MOUNT VERNON, Mo. — A Conway woman recently was granted a suspended sentence and probation when she pleaded guilty in Lawrence County Circuit Court to a drug trafficking charge.

Tara L. Ivey, 30, pleaded guilty May 11 to first-degree trafficking in drugs in a plea agreement with the Lawrence County prosecutor's office that called for a 10-year suspended sentence with five years of supervised probation.

Judge David Cole accepted the plea deal and assessed the agreed-upon terms of her sentence.

Ivey was arrested June 18, 2019, after a traffic accident on Missouri Highway 96 at the intersection with County Road 1085 in Lawrence County. A probable-cause affidavit states that she was a passenger in a car that passed a Jasper County transport officer and forced another vehicle off the road shortly before leaving the roadway and crashing.

The transport officer who pursued the vehicle tried to corral the three occupants of the overturned vehicle as they crawled out, but the driver, Douglas S. Ward Jr., 32, and Carl W. Dill II, 26, of Conway, both ran as the third occupant, Ivey, was yelling at the officer.

All three eventually were detained by Missouri State Highway Patrol officers who came to the Jasper County transport officer's aid and a discarded bag containing a little more than three ounces of meth was recovered.

Ward pleaded guilty to a trafficking charge a year ago and received a 15-year suspended sentence. Dill was found guilty of trafficking in drugs and resisting arrest in a jury trial in April and will be sentenced June 15.