IRONTON — On the day she was to have stood trial, a former Ironton police officer pleaded guilty Thursday to a misdemeanor charge of falsification and avoided the prison time that was possible if she had been convicted of a more serious felony charge of tampering with evidence.

Beth Rist, 46, of Ironton, was instead sentenced to 60 days in jail and two years probation but visiting Judge Fred Crow suspended the jail sentence.

“The only reason we agreed to do this was to avoid her possibly being convicted of a felony,” Rist’s attorney, Warren Morford, said after the court proceedings. “Although we strongly felt she did not commit any crime and would have been successful at trial, this was a huge gamble to take and if she had been convicted of a felony her life would have been over.”

When the agreement was reached last week to reduce the felony to a misdemeanor, Morford indicated the misdemeanor itself would not automatically preclude Rist from seeking a job with another law enforcement agency. But Lawrence County Prosecutor J.B. Collier Jr., said while technically, pleading to a misdemeanor may mean Rist could seek a law enforcement job elsewhere, in practice she might have difficulty finding such work after admitting she faked a traffic ticket.

“Her credibility as a police officer is shot and in my opinion she should never work in law enforcement again,” Collier said. “You can’t fabricate a crime though the result may be praiseworthy. Unfortunately she did that. She can never be a credible witness. She lied in the performance of her duties.”

Rist was fired last year after she wrote a questioned traffic ticket. She stopped a woman for a traffic violation and determined the driver had no insurance. She then allowed Dolly Newcomb’s daughter, Jamie Sparks, to come to the scene and take the traffic ticket in her mother’s place.

After Sparks paid the ticket, her driver’s license was revoked for violating state law on vehicle insurance.

Sparks then complained to city officials and Rist was fired. She is seeking to regain her job through the union grievance process. No date has yet been set for an arbitration hearing, Morford said.