Oklahoma Mom Patricia Marilyn Spottedcrow Gets 10 Years for Selling $31 of Marijuana

An Oklahoma woman has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for selling $31 of marijuana.

Patricia Marilyn Spottedcrow, a 25-year-old mother of four, and her mother, Delita Starr, 50, sold an $11 dime bag to a police informant in Oklahoma on Dec. 31, 2009. The informant returned two weeks later to buy $20 of marijuana. Spottedcrow, who worked in nursing homes before her arrest, told The Oklahoman she did it to get some extra money.

Patricia Marilyn Spottedcrow, a 25-year-old Oklahoma mother of four, has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for selling $31 of marijuana. (Oklahoma Dept. of Corrections)

Oklahoma Dept. of Corrections

Patricia Marilyn Spottedcrow, a 25-year-old mother of four, has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for selling $31 of marijuana.

The women were charged with drug distribution and possession of a dangerous substance in the presence of a minor, because Spottedcrow's children were in the house during the transaction. They were offered plea deals of two years in prison but decided to enter a guilty plea instead, a gamble they took because neither had prior convictions and because the amount of drugs sold was so small.

The gamble did not pay off. Spottedcrow was given sentences of 10 years in prison for distribution and two years for possession, to run concurrently. When she was picked up to be taken to prison, she had marijuana in her jacket pocket, which led to another two-year concurrent sentence and a fine of nearly $1,300.

Starr received a suspended sentence of 30 years with no incarceration and five years of drug and alcohol assessments.

Spottedcrow began her sentence at Eddie Warrior Correctional Center three days before Christmas.

Read more at The Oklahoman.