Harold Artice Ivy
WHITE CO. – As of press time for this issue (July 15), additional charges were still pending against a White County teen whose alleged actions ultimately lead to the death of a local Carmi man.
Harold Artice Ivy, 18, is the teen in question.
The situation emerged on Monday, June 18, at approximately 9:37 p.m., when White County dispatch received a 911 call about two intoxicated males who had just battered one Jonathan Smith, and broke out the windshield on his truck, this on Fifth Street. Smith had left the area, but not before he observed two suspects fleeing north.
Authorities advised Smith to return to the area to meet with police…but before officers even arrived, there had been another call made to dispatch, this at 9:40 p.m., from a male who advised that he had just located a man who had apparently been on a bike and way lying partially in the roadway, unconscious and bleeding profusely from head wounds.
Officers arrived to that scene and found one Toby Sanders, 55, breathing but unconscious.
The caller who found Sanders stated that two males, whom the caller believed to have been Leif Harper and Harold Artice Ivy, fled from the scene in a black vehicle. There were several citizens coming to the scene, but none had observed what happened with Sanders, so it wasn’t immediately clear if he’d had an accident while riding his bicycle or if he’d been the victim of a crime.
Whatever the case, Sanders was removed from the scene and ultimately airlifted to Deaconess in Evansville.
Authorities questioned Smith at length, and as it turned out, Smith’s battery – allegedly by Ivy – was actually observed by three other individuals, one a passenger in the vehicle with him, and the other two being in a truck that had been on the road ahead of him when the attack occurred.
Smith signed a complaint against Ivy…but the focus was now all on what had happened to Sanders.
Fielding incorrect reports about how Sanders was injured (many had believed that he’d been run over by a vehicle, and had started spreading that information on social networking), authorities asked the public for help in locating Ivy, who happened to have recently been convicted of a Class 4 felony he caught back in early May at the alternative school in Norris City, Criminal Damage to Government Property. On May 14, Ivy had been placed on two years probation after that stunt, and had been ordered to perform two years of public service, to pay $1,783 in fines and fees, and most importantly, to not get into any trouble…something that’s apparently a stretch, as according to many in the area, Ivy is a wannabe gangsta and apparently believes (albeit mistakenly) he can earn his stripes in someplace as conservative about gang activity as Carmi.
Ivy ran from the area, only to be found a couple of days later in Washington, Indiana. He was extradited back to White County on the evening of Tuesday, June 26, and charged with Class 3 Aggravated Battery Causing Great Bodily Harm; Class 3 felony Aggravated Battery in a Public Place; and Class A misdemeanor Criminal Damage to Property (for Smith’s windshield).
In the meantime, Sanders remained on life support in Deaconess.
On July 1, his family opted to take him off life support, and he was declared deceased by the Vanderburgh County Coroner.
What, exactly, was cause of death remained under investigation, then under wraps, as White County State’s Attorney Denton Aud was, as of press time, still awaiting results from such an examination of the injuries. An MR (miscellaneous remedy) case had been filed by Aud on July 3, in which it clearly stated that the state had “received information alleging Murder and Manslaughter…relating to the death of Toby Lane Sanders on July 1, 2018, the victim of an aggravated battery.”
The MR filing was asking for subpoenas to be issued to obtain all medical records, labs, CT and other scans and tests, photos and doctor and nurse notes regarding Sanders in order to determine the cause – or causes – of his death.
Deaconess had informed Carmi PD that they would need a formal subpoena to acquire the records, hence the filing.
There was no word as of press time as to when that subpoena would be answered.
However, there was one other factor that has yet to be addressed by authorities: That of the report that Leif Harper had recorded the beating of Sanders on his cell phone.
No one in a position of authority had spoken to the veracity of that report. However, Harper has not been charged with any crime thus far; at least, none that can be ascertained.
As explained in the front page story about Kory Kuizenga, a battery that leads to death isn’t always filed as a murder. The way the law reads in Illinois, a person can batter another seriously, but if the individual is hospitalized for a lengthy period of time before dying of those injuries or complications thereof, it all too frequently doesn’t result in a murder charge. Most of the time, the Aggravated Battery charge sticks, as the max time for battery can sometimes equal the minimum time for murder (another bizarre Illinois law factoid.) Sometimes, the death is filed as manslaughter as opposed to murder, only because murder requires intent in order to convict, and manslaughter is a little easier of a conviction to obtain.
Ivy remains jailed on a quarter-million-dollar bond in White County. He is set for a next hearing on August 15.
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