Madison County prosecutors dropped drug-induced homicide charges against a Bethalto woman accused for her role in two heroin overdose deaths.

Instead, Angela Halliday, 28, pleaded guilty to one count of unlawful delivery of alprazolam, or Xanax, a controlled substance, within 1,000 feet of a church and two counts of unlawful delivery of a controlled substance within 1,000 feet of a school, Madison County State's Attorney spokeswoman Stephanee Smith stated in an email Wednesday.

Halliday pleaded guilty to the Class 2 felonies and her sentencing is set for a later date. She remains in custody.

Halliday could have faced up to 30 years in prison if she was convicted of drug-induced homicide.

In the first case, Halliday allegedly obtained the heroin that her friend, Benjamin Berkenbile, overdosed on in May 2011.

In the second case, Brian Beckham, 32, of East Alton, was accused of driving Rogers and his girlfriend, Halliday, to St. Louis to buy heroin from Adam C. Butler, 42, of north St. Louis County.

Halliday allegedly had been selling her Xanax prescription in order to pay for heroin, which Rogers injected in Missouri before dying April 2011 in a Godfrey motel where they had been staying for two weeks.

Beckham pleaded guilty in May to unlawful possession of heroin with intent to deliver. He was sentenced to two years' probation and was expected to be released from jail Friday for nine months time served.

Prosecutors dropped a drug-induced homicide charge against Butler in May.

The prosecution of Halliday -- as well as Beckham and Butler -- were affected by the ruling in a separate case.

Taylor Kennedy, 20, of Troy, was acquitted of drug-induced homicide May 10 by Associate Judge James Hackett because Kennedy allegedly bought and provided the heroin that killed his 17-year-old girlfriend, Shannon Gaddis, in Missouri, and not in Illinois as required by the law. Gaddis died of a heroin overdose in January 2011 in her home near Troy.

After the Kennedy case, state Sen. Bill Haine, D-Alton, sponsored a measure, at the request of Madison County State's Attorney Tom Gibbons, to change the drug-induced homicide law.

The proposed amendment would have allowed prosecution of cases in which drugs were bought outside Illinois.

The Senate approved the bill May 25, but the bill never got out of the House's Criminal Law Committee before the legislative session ended.

Contact reporter Jacqueline Lee at jlee@bnd.com or 239-2655.