For four years, Starla Smith has been waiting for a sentence that never seems to arrive. Smith, the mother of Thomas Ferguson, says her rights under Marsy’s Law have been steamrolled as a DUI-related manslaughter case in northeast Oklahoma City crawls toward the finish line with no punishment yet handed down.
The woman charged in the 2022 crash, Tracy Mitchell, entered a blind no-contest plea earlier this year. Even so, Smith says her family is still stuck in limbo instead of getting the closure they were promised. Every July 14, she visits her son’s grave. Each year that passes without a sentence, she told reporters, makes the grief feel heavier and the wait more unbearable.
Case details and schedule
According to News 9, Mitchell is charged with manslaughter in Ferguson’s death and was originally set to be sentenced in May. That hearing was delayed and pushed to August. The judge also allowed Mitchell to remain free on bond until sentencing, the station reported. The Oklahoma County District Attorney’s Office declined to comment further while the case is still pending.
What Marsy’s Law guarantees victims
Marsy’s Law, a victims’ rights amendment approved by Oklahoma voters in 2018, promises crime victims a prompt conclusion of the case and the right to be informed and heard at crucial stages of a prosecution, including plea hearings and sentencing. As outlined by Marsy’s Law for Oklahoma, victims can go to court to enforce those rights if they believe they have been ignored.
Local support offices, including the Oklahoma County Victim-Witness Center, routinely cite the amendment when stressing that families should be notified about plea deals, scheduling changes and other major developments in a case.
How blind pleas work in Oklahoma
In Oklahoma, a blind plea, including a no-contest plea without a sentencing agreement, hands full sentencing discretion to the judge and leaves both prosecution and defense waiting to find out the punishment. The Oklahoma Bar Association notes that defendants who choose blind pleas are essentially throwing themselves on the mercy of the court, because there is no written deal to control the sentence…