Misty Croslin to face sentencing today

If Misty Croslin has any more secrets to tell regarding the disappearance of Haleigh Cummings, she will have one last chance today before she is sentenced on multiple counts of dealing prescription drugs in Putnam County.

Croslin, 19, was living with Haleigh’s father, Ronald Cummings, and was in the house with the girl when she disappeared in 2009.

That case has never been solved.

In the meantime, Croslin, Ronald Cummings and several others were arrested in January 2010 on multiple counts of trafficking prescription drugs.

All have been sentenced, including Croslin on one count in St. Johns County. But today she faces sentencing in Putnam County on seven counts.

Putnam County investigators would talk to Croslin if she has anything more to say about the Haleigh case, said Capt. Johnny Greenwood.

“We’ll meet with her if she reaches out and wants to talk about the case. We’d definitely talk to her. We’d talk to anyone,” Greenwood said.

Croslin is currently in the Lowell Correctional Institution, a state women’s prison in Marion County, serving the 25-year St. Johns County sentence.

Her grandmother, Flora Hollars, said she talks frequently with Croslin on the phone. Hollars said Croslin is trying to make the best of the situation.

“She’s doing real good. She’s going to school and making As,” Hollars said. “I question her every time she calls me to see what I can get, and I haven’t gotten anything to report yet.”

Haleigh was reported missing from her Satsuma home at about 3:30 a.m. Feb. 10, 2009. Croslin initially said she was asleep with Haleigh, then age 5, and Ronald Cummings Jr., then age 2. Croslin awoke to find Haleigh missing.

That story changed last summer while Croslin and her brother, Hank “Tommy” Croslin Jr., were jailed on the drug charges.

Both Croslins implicated a cousin from Tennessee, Joe Overstreet, with an attack on Haleigh. Tommy Croslin contends Overstreet then disposed of her body in the St. Johns River off a boat ramp between Satsuma and Welaka.

A three-day search of the St. Johns in the vicinity of the ramp failed to find any evidence of her body. Overstreet has denied the allegations.

When Croslin was sentenced in St. Johns County in October, her attorney, Robert Fields, argued that Croslin should be sentenced as a youthful offender.

That would have landed her a six-year sentence rather than the mandatory minimum of 25 years for the amount of oxycodone involved in the charge.

Fields also called Croslin’s mother, Lisa, to testify about Croslin’s difficult upbringing and poor education.

Fields did not return phone messages last week.

Greenwood said new leads in the Haleigh case are scarce, but he added investigators follow every bit of information they get. He would not say if detectives have spoken with Croslin since last year, when she told them of Overstreet’s alleged involvement.

“We’re still investigating the case. We get the occasional tip, but we are not getting the steady tips we did initially,” Greenwood said. “We always maintain the case will get solved. We have to. When a tip or lead comes in, we follow it to the end.”

Steve Brown, a private investigator who worked on the case for Tommy Croslin, said he continues to get information about the case as well.