Woman Who Sold Methamphetamine to Undercover Agent Sentenced to Over 13 Years in Federal Prison

A woman who sold methamphetamine to an undercover agent was sentenced today to 160 months in federal prison for her involvement in a conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine.

Heather Sue Hartzell, age 32, from Waverly, Iowa, received the prison term after a December 21, 2023 guilty plea to one count of conspiracy to distribute a controlled substance.

In 2022, an undercover agent purchased methamphetamine from Hartzell outside her residence in Waterloo, Iowa. Approximately one month later, law enforcement officers stopped Hartzell while she was in a car with her eventual co-defendant James Douglas Morrison returning from Des Moines. Inside the car, Hartzell and Morrison had almost 2,000 grams of "ice" methamphetamine that Morrison had obtained from his supplier in Des Moines, Iowa. Morrison also had a gun.

Hartzell was sentenced in Cedar Rapids by United States District Court Chief Judge C.J. Williams. Hartzell was sentenced to 160 months' imprisonment. She must also serve a three-year term of supervised release after the prison term. There is no parole in the federal system. Hartzell is being held in the United States Marshal's custody until she can be transported to a federal prison.

The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Nicole L. Nagin, and it was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Tri-County Drug Enforcement Task Force, the Iowa Division of Narcotics Enforcement, the Black Hawk County Sherriff's Office, and the Waterloo Police Department.

Court file information at https://ecf.iand.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/login.pl.

The case file number is 23-CR-2045.

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