Headley approves Smoot for Community Transition Program
GREENCASTLE -- A Greencastle man sentenced in April to a six-year Indiana Department of Correction sentence has been approved for release into the DOC's Community Transition Program.
Michael Smoot, 45, was convicted of Class C felony possession of cocaine on April 2. He has been serving his sentence at the Putnamville Correctional Facility.
Smoot was originally charged with a Class A felony charge of dealing in cocaine. The charge was downgraded as the result of a plea agreement. He could have received a maximum of eight years.
Judge Matthew Headley ordered that Smoot would serve three years at the DOC, one year on home detention and two years on probation. Smoot received credit for 175 days he had spent in the Putnam County Jail prior to his sentencing.
Although Smoot will be on electronic home monitoring, he will still technically be a DOC inmate. His earliest possible release date is listed on the DOC Web site as April 4, 2010.
Smoot was arrested in October 2008 after eluding capture for several months. After being tipped off on March 22, 2008 that police were coming for him, Smoot took his wife and toddler daughter and fled to Indianapolis, court records said.
At his sentencing in April, Putnam County Probation Officer Teresa Parrish objected to Smoot being placed on house arrest because the drug dealing Smoot had done had been from his home.
Police secured a warrant in for Smoot's arrest after Smoot sold nine bags of cocaine to a confidential informant in March 2008. He was arrested in October 2008 during a traffic stop in Marion County.