Records say drugs in driver’s system

A North Little Rock woman was driving 105 mph and had alcohol, cocaine, PCP and other substances in her system at the time of a crash that killed her passenger, authorities said.

Miranda Duncan, 36, was arrested last week on negligent-homicide charges in the 2017 death of Joshua Barbee, 33.

According to court documents, Duncan was driving a white Ford Crown Victoria north on Arch Street around 2:50 p.m. on Nov. 8 when the vehicle left the road, hit a concrete culvert, went airborne and hit a tree.

A witness described the vehicle passing him “at a high rate of speed” over a solid double yellow line just before the wreck, police said.

Investigators wrote in a probable-cause affidavit that a later reading of the vehicle’s powertrain control module showed that it was traveling 105 mph one second before impact.

Barbee, who was riding in the front passenger seat, died in the crash, while Duncan was thrown out and suffered serious injuries, records show.

Duncan was transported to UAMS Medical Center, where authorities collected a urine sample for a toxicology screening.

That sample tested positive for PCP, cocaine, promethazine (an antihistamine), methorphan, citalopram (an antidepressant), cannabinoids and ethanol, according to the affidavit.

According to Little Rock Police Department spokesman Lt. Michael Ford, investigators had to wait several months for the results of the toxicology screening, which accounts for the delay between the date of the crash and the serving of an arrest warrant.

It’s not unusual for those results to take some time to finish processing, he said.

Duncan’s bail was set at $15,000 during a video arraignment Tuesday.