Pubdate: Mon, 23 Jun 2003
Source: Lexington Herald-Leader (KY)
Copyright: 2003 Lexington Herald-Leader
Contact:  http://www.kentucky.com/mld/heraldleader/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/240
Author: Deborah Hastings, ASSOCIATED PRESS

Close-Up

THE TALE OF TULIA

Small-Town Injustice

TULIA, Texas - What happened here is not simply a study in black and white, 
despite the skin colors of its characters. It is not purely a story of 
stupidity and arrogance, though both are prevalent.

It is a tragedy of small minds and made-up crimes that eventually created 
one of the worst miscarriages of justice in Texas history.

Thomas Roland Coleman, the son of a locally famous Texas Ranger, drove into 
this dried-up place and cruised the battered roads where black people live. 
For 18 months, beginning in 1998, he said he was T.J. Dawson, a laborer 
whose girlfriend needed cocaine to get in the mood for sex.

He was really an undercover cop for a drug task force based in Amarillo. 
Coleman was allowed to work alone for The Panhandle Regional Narcotics 
Trafficking Task Force. He kept no written records, save incident reports 
filed with seized evidence, reports later determined to be false. No 
photographs were taken. No video was shot. No one observed his buys.

Every ensuing conviction relied on one thing: his word.

By the time he finished testifying, 38 people, 35 of them black, had been 
convicted of selling small amounts of cocaine and sentenced to prison for 
as long as 90 years. For this, he was named Texas' outstanding narcotics 
officer in 2000.

Problem is, the star witness lied on the stand and several other places. 
Another problem: Swisher County District Attorney Terry McEachern, Sheriff 
Larry Stewart and District Judge Ed Self, who heard most of the cases, knew 
the witness had a tarnished record in law enforcement. That information was 
kept from jurors and from defense attorneys.

The Tulia cases have languished for four years. Last Monday, 12 people in 
state prison were released on their own recognizance pending a ruling on 
their future from the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, which could take as 
long as two years. Four others remain in custody.

Despite continuing federal and state investigations, not one conviction has 
been overturned, and no action has been taken against officials from 
Swisher County or the task force.

Blatant perjury

The state appointed two special prosecutors earlier this year to hold 
hearings to determine whether Coleman's testimony was indeed the sole basis 
for conviction in four cases. And to find out if the prosecution team 
withheld information damaging to their star witness. The answer to both 
questions: yes.

Retired Dallas District Judge Ron Chapman -- appointed after Self recused 
himself -- stopped the hearings one day after Coleman took the stand, 
saying Coleman was committing "blatant perjury."

A stipulation signed in May by the judge, the special prosecutors and 
defense lawyers working pro bono for the NAACP Legal Defense and 
Educational Fund in New York said all 38 convictions should be overturned, 
including 27 plea bargains signed to avoid lengthy prison terms.

Coleman is "the most devious, non-responsive witness this court has 
witnessed in 25 years on the bench in Texas," the judge wrote. Coleman also 
was a bigot who used the "n" word on the job, testimony showed.

The 129-page finding also faulted local officials for:

. Allowing Sheriff Stewart to testify that he hadn't received any negative 
information about Coleman "despite the fact that he himself arrested 
Coleman" in August 1998.

He had walked off his job as a Cochran County sheriff's deputy and skipped 
town owing more than $7,000 to local stores that extended credit because he 
was a deputy, and stole more than 100 gallons of gasoline from county 
pumps, documents and testimony showed. Charges of theft and abusing 
authority were dropped when Coleman made restitution.

. Portraying Coleman in court as an exemplary officer with no criminal record.

Taking out the trash

Tulia, population 5,000 and dropping, isn't much more than a wide spot in 
the road between Amarillo and Lubbock. Even now, some residents believe 
drugs cause most problems here.

A depressed economy is the more likely cause. Jobs and people have been 
leaving here since the Texas economy shifted two decades ago and buried 
small oil, farming and cattle businesses.

Black residents, who number about 400, mostly work behind the scenes, in 
the fields, the restaurant kitchens, and the nearby prison. Some can't or 
won't work, and live on welfare in federally subsidized housing -- and it 
is from these ranks that Coleman culled most cases.

Coleman first went after local troublemakers identified by the sheriff, 
according to defense lawyers. The sheriff denied those claims. Then Coleman 
went after their families and friends, until he had 46 indictments.

On July 23, 1999, Coleman, flanked by other officers, rousted people from 
their beds and paraded them across the courthouse lawn before a tipped-off 
news media gantlet. No drugs or paraphernalia or money or guns were found 
during the arrests.

The now-defunct local paper, the Tulia Sentinel, ran a headline declaring 
"Tulia's Streets Cleared of Garbage."

Pig farmer Joe Welton Moore was the first to go on trial. He was the drug 
kingpin of Tulia, authorities said. He lived in a shack with a dirt front 
yard. After a one-day trial, Moore -- who has a previous narcotics felony 
on his record -- was sentenced to 90 years. He was among those released 
last week.

All of the busts were for powder cocaine, which is heavier and more 
expensive than the rock variety. Texas law allows stiffer punishments for 
heavier seizures. This point was not lost on defense attorneys who later 
reviewed the lengthy jail terms meted out.

Drug laws also allow longer sentences when sales are made near schools or 
parks. Conveniently, defense attorneys said, Coleman reported nearly all of 
his purchases near these locations.

"I'm not saying now and I have never said that all these people are 
innocent," said Lubbock criminal defense attorney Rod Hobson. "But here's 
the thing -- out of 38 people, if even one of them is innocent -- then how 
can you base a conviction on Coleman's word in any one of these cases?"

One defendant died before trial. Seven cases were dropped. Some defendants 
proved they were elsewhere when Coleman said he bought drugs from them.

Hobson was appointed to represent Coleman and his employers. Instead, he 
felt ethically bound to indict him. "The star witness doesn't tell the 
truth -- I mean, what am I supposed to do?"

Three counts of aggravated perjury were filed in April over Coleman's 
evidentiary hearing testimony. It's too late to charge him for his trial 
testimony; the statute of limitations has run out.

Coleman is free on bail pending trial. His phone is disconnected, and his 
attorney, Cindy Ermatinger, did not return phone messages. Nor did 
McEachern, Stewart or Self. All three have denied wrongdoing.

When defense attorneys tried to get Coleman's background introduced as 
evidence, Self ruled no, saying legal precedent allowed attorneys to use 
only prior criminal convictions -- not charges -- to try to impeach the 
credibility of a witness.

Paul Holloway was appointed by the court to represent four Tulia residents. 
He asked Self for money to hire an investigator. He was denied. He laid out 
his defense theory to the judge, suggesting Coleman might have manufactured 
his own evidence, and asked for detailed audits of task force spending. 
Self denied the requests.

"It's not justice," Holloway said. "This not even vaguely like anything 
I've ever known about the system."

A threatened civil suit against Swisher County was dropped in exchange for 
a total settlement of $250,000 for the defendants and the promise to not 
pursue further litigation. But Hobson said neither money nor scandal has 
changed Tulia.

"I mean, the depth of dumbness of the people I'm working with," he said. 
"I'm telling you, this thing could happen again tomorrow up there. I mean, 
they have learned nothing." 
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MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart