Dateline: April 24, 2003

Drug case yields three more plea bargains

By Roger Estlack, Clarendon Enterprise

Three more defendants have accepted plea bargains as a result of drug-related indictments issued by the Donley County Grand Jury in January.

David Ray Tolbert was sentenced to ten years in the state penitentiary by District Judge David McCoy last Monday as a result of a plea.

Timothy Don Lockeby and Joshua Lamar Allred received ten years probation after they agreed to help District Attorney Stuart Messer’s office prosecute the other defendants in the case.

Tolbert, Lockeby, and Lamar, along with Darrell Thomas, were indicted January 24 on the allegation that they had agreed to deliver methamphetamine to an inmate in the county jail. They were charged with the first degree felony of Engaging in Organized Criminal Activity.

Thomas accepted a plea last month and was also sentenced to ten years in the state penitentiary.

Prosecution against another defendant is still pending in the case. Lauren Thomas had been charged as a juvenile since she was 16 at the time of the offense. Messer said she has since been certified as an adult and faces the same felony charge as the other defendants.

All five individuals allegedly engaged in organized criminal activity between October 1, 2002, and January 9, 2003, during which time seven deliveries of methamphetamine were made to an inmate in the Donley County Jail.

“This has been swift justice,” Messer said. “I appreciated the Donley County Sheriff’s Office and the good job they did with the investigation on this case.”