Pubdate: Mon, 10 Oct 2005
Source: Sun News (Myrtle Beach, SC)
Copyright: 2005 Sun Publishing Co.
Contact:  http://www.myrtlebeachonline.com/mld/sunnews/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/987
Note: apparent 150 word limit on LTEs
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/coke.htm (Cocaine)

WOMAN GARNERS ATTENTION AGAIN IN DRUG CASE

Tara Anderson made headlines 17 years ago as a law student who said a 
sitting judge had offered her cocaine at a party.

Earlier this year, the now 44-year-old Tara Anderson Thompson is 
seeing her own legal career brought down by cocaine use.

She was found guilty last month in federal court of conspiring to 
launder drug money. The federal conviction comes on top of her guilty 
plea to state drug charges. She said she couldn't point to a reason 
for her drug use, though she said she was depressed about the breakup 
of her second marriage.

Thompson faces a maximum of 20 years in prison but is likely to spend 
only months in jail if she goes at all. Either way, her law career is 
over much as a judge's time on the bench ended in 1988 when she 
accused Larry Richter and another lawyer of offering her drugs at a party.

The allegation never was proved, but Richter chose not to seek 
another term on the bench. He later won a seat in the state Senate 
and made a run for attorney general. Richter refused to comment.
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MAP posted-by: Elizabeth Wehrman