Laura Jean Nelson, 34, is charged in district court in Minot with Class B felony delivery of methamphetamine.

Court records show that the alleged offenses date back to May 20, 2019 but the complaint was not filed until April 15 of this year and Nelson was only scheduled to make a court appearance on the charge on Monday morning. A preliminary hearing in the case is scheduled for Jan. 7, 2021 before Judge Todd Cresap. According to the probable cause affidavit filed with the court, Nelson sold the meth on two different occasions to an officer working undercover with the Ward County Narcotics Task Force. One of the deals took place behind the Town and Country Shopping Center when Nelson was taking a smoke break from the drug rehab aftercare she was attending.

In a separate case, Nelson was sentenced to five years last September, with a requirement she serve two years, for dealing meth and heroin in the area. Prison records show that she was paroled in April after serving roughly nine months in custody. She was also placed on supervised probation for three years.