JONESBORO, Ark. – A convicted killer is posting photos of himself on Facebook and has been since less than one year into his 19 year prison sentence.
On November 13, 2017, Austin D. Ivy admitted to the court that he murdered Alicia “Bird” Carr, a young Paragould resident. He was sentenced to 19 years in prison with 5 additional years suspended. He’s in East Arkansas Regional Unit still today and he has to serve 70-percent of the sentence (11 more years) before he has a chance at parole – and this won’t help those chances.
Less one year later, Ivy somehow obtained a cellular phone in prison. Since then, he’s been on Facebook posting to his profile “Luh Austin” with images of him in prison, flipping off the camera, and taking pills.
Since around August, 2018, Ivy appears to have acquired a cell phone on the inside of his prison cell. In addition to a stream of selfies of him in prison clothing on the inside of his prison cell, or in the showers, he’s calling and even Facetime chatting with a plethora of his friends.
He also appears to be looking for a “luh” girlfriend.
It appears Ivy obtained the phone on or before August 17, 2018. This is when his the first post appears since being in jail the previous year. It states “Austin words : I see how when u in the free everyone in ya face but when u get locked (up) everybody MIA”
For the next several days, Ivy continued to post. One of his post said he wished he could go back to how it used to be. Some of the posts by the Luh Austin profile appear to be by members of his family who might also have access to the account.
While many of Ivy’s friends are supporting him, one of his potential victims also made several posts about how Ivy tried to take him out.
Ivy’s posts continued with him saying #FreeAustin before he decided to address his victim and her family. Ivy said to everyone, “including bird’s family,” that it wasn’t his intentions for her to “loose” her life that night.
NEA Report contacted Second Judicial District Prosecuting Attorney Scott Ellington about this on Wednesday afternoon. He did not respond.
More recent posts by Ivy show him including the number “2030,” presumably the year he expects to be released. However, this is just the first date he is to be eligible for parole and does not guarantee he would be released. A parole board must evaluate whether the criminal has been rehabilitated, feels remorse, and is capable of returning safely to society. In addition to the parole board having the authority to make him serve the full 19 years, he could end up receiving the other five year suspended sentence added on if prosecutors convince a judge he violated terms of his plea agreement.
While Ivy was being held in Craighead County Detention Center, a number of photos of him in a jail uniform were also posted to the same Facebook profile.
NEA Report reached out to the Arkansas Department of Correction about this. The Public Information Officer was out of the office but we left a message and later at 5:46 PM received this statement:
We were made aware of the posts earlier today, and are investigating potential violations of our inmate conduct standards.
Solomon Graves
Public Information Officer & Legislative Liaison
Arkansas Department of Correction
Ivy’s profile can be located here (as of the date of publication)
You really got a lot of time on your hands huh, reporting everybody business cause you ain’t got nun of your own.
That is his job as a reporter, dumb ass.
Your pathetic talk trash and hide behind a screen name you sorry p.o.s.
I hope he’s someones little girlfriend in there and he could do us all a favor and do what his daddy did “kill himself”. He should be sent to the hole and have all his privileges took away and given a lot more time. From the pictures it doesn’t look like he’s doing hard time to me, I’ve heard Arkansas prison’s are soft I guess this proves it .
I want to know what the other kid got that was with Ivy shooting at the car, why isn’t he in prison or did the Prosecutor Scott Ellington make another deal that if Ivy plead guilty he wouldn’t do anything to the other kid? Who was the other thug?
Brian Cruz was ivys accomplice that night,the other three guys and the mother of Cruz a phillipino,at first all swore statements to keep from being locked up, then as the trial begin recanted their eyewitness accounts of the events,and the Philippino woman couldn’t speak English anymore.They all begin to feel preassure from the street about being considered snitches and with their drug dealing and use didn’t want to be cut off,the prosecutor should have charged them with perjury for recanting their sworn testimony,as the case fell apart he offered up a plea deal and it was accepted,during the same week under same circumstances a murderer was released.Sad so many people can just look the other way!