By: Patti Weaver
(Stillwater, Okla.) — A Perkins man avoided a jury trial this week on a negligent homicide charge by entering a plea on Feb. 21 in which he did not admit guilt, but only that “I agree the state would produce the evidence they have in their probable cause affidavit.”
Jeremy Elton Dye, 33, was placed on four years’ probation last week under a deferred sentence by Payne County District Judge Phillip Corley, who ordered him to pay $3,177 restitution and a $1,000 fine, court records show.
Dye was charged with recklessly driving off the road at 2400 S. Main Street in Stillwater and fatally hitting a 19-year-old woman as she was pushing her infant son in a stroller. The victim, Lily Ann Schallot Carey, died from her injuries and her baby was hospitalized, court records show.
The fatal collision occurred at about 9:29 p.m. on Oct. 16, 2016, approximately half a mile south of the Stillwater city limits, Oklahoma Highway Patrol Trooper Todd Hatchett wrote in an affidavit.
When Dye was initially questioned by Stillwater Police Officer Shawn Millermon, Dye said “the collision happened near the guardrail and his wife thought they had hit a deer. Dye pulled over and noticed he had hit a person. Millermon asked Dye if he had anything to drink or had ingested any type of drug.
“Dye said he was 10 days sober from methamphetamine use and had not taken or drunk anything on that day,” the trooper’s affidavit alleged.
Questioned by OHP Trooper Anthony Harper, Dye said that he was trying to stop using methamphetamine and had been on prescribed suboxone for the last eight months, the affidavit alleged. Dye said he had taken one gram of suboxone at about 8 a.m. that day, the affidavit alleged.
Based on the physical evidence, Trooper Harper believed that the collision occurred on the shoulder, the affidavit alleged.
A month earlier, Dye had been charged with possessing methamphetamine at the Cimarron Casino in Perkins on Sept. 5, 2016, a felony to which he pleaded guilty on May 3, 2017. In that case, Dye was sentenced by Associate District Judge Stephen Kistler on Dec. 6, 2017, to five years’ probation, with an order to have a substance abuse evaluation, perform any follow-up, undergo random drug testing, comply with the methamphetamine registry, do 100 hours of community service and pay $1,800 in assessments, court records show.
A civil lawsuit, which was filed in Payne County against Dye on behalf of the deceased woman and her infant son, was stricken from a docket on July 28, 2017, since the defendant had filed advice of bankruptcy, court records show.
According to the state Department of Corrections, Dye had been released from incarceration in August of 2008 after serving one year and eight months of two concurrent five-year prison terms for methamphetamine possession and concealing stolen property in 2006 in Logan County, followed by five years of probation.
Dye had also been given a concurrent prison term of four years and nine months in 2006 for concealing stolen property in Caddo County in 2004, DOC records show. Dye had also been placed on three years’ probation under a deferred sentence for methamphetamine possession in Oklahoma County in 2005, DOC records show.
Negligent homicide, a misdemeanor, carries a maximum penalty on conviction of a one-year jail term and a $1,000 fine, court records show.
***
