Postcards purported to be from "Mamaw" and mailed to the Union County jail got three women in El Dorado sent to federal prison after methamphetamine was found hidden under stamps and return address labels.
According to federal court records, Carla Dawn Smith mailed two postcards to two inmates in the Union County jail, Kasey Doss and Meredith Atwell, in September 2017. The return address labels on the postcards were in the name of Atwell's grandmother, who she called Mamaw, the records say.
The three were charged in federal court because Doss and Atwell were in federal custody and Union County was holding them under contract with the federal government, making it a federal lockup, according to the records.
Jailers had suspected that the postcards concealed drugs when they arrived in the mail and placed them in evidence, records say. The postcards were sent to the state Crime Laboratory in Little Rock where they were tested and found to contain methamphetamine, the documents say.
Atwell had told deputy marshals that Smith was good at smuggling drugs into the jail, the records say. Smith told the marshals she had sent eight postcards to Atwell. Smith also once filled a coffee stirrer with methamphetamine and inserted it in the seam of a bra that was passed on through a jailer to Atwell, court records said.
To confirm the women's stories, according to the records, deputy marshals listened to recorded phone calls that Smith had with Atwell and Doss. The deputy marshals heard Doss telling Smith she was in "need of mail," the documents say.
According to records, Atwell told Smith in one conversation, "Kasey said you're a bad a b*. Dang, I could not feel that stuff but I think Kasey did. I need you to mail me a label tomorrow."
Smith pleaded guilty to attempting to provide methamphetamine to inmates in a federal facility. She was sentenced Thursday to 46 months in prison with credit given for time served, according to the court records.
Atwell and Doss pleaded guilty to possession or attempting to possess methamphetamine while they were inmates in a federal facility, the records said.
Atwell was sentenced to 18 months in prison, with the sentence to be served consecutively with a 12-month sentence she was given in a separate case after pleading guilty to fraud. She also was ordered to pay $141,505.52 in restitution for stealing money in 2016 from the Southern Arkansas Substance Abuse treatment center where she was the bookkeeper, records said.
Doss was sentenced to 12 months and a day in prison to run consecutively with an 84-month sentence she received after pleading guilty to conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine.
All three were recommended to participate in the Intensive Drug Treatment Program.
NW News on 02/17/2019