Pubdate: Mon, 31 Dec 2001
Source: Associated Press (Wire)
Copyright: 2002 Associated Press
Author: Susan Parrott (AP)

CHIEF DEFENDS USE OF PAID INFORMANT IN FAKE DRUGS CASE

Police officials admitted Monday they paid a confidential informant 
$200,000 for information leading to dozens of drug busts, only to find out 
later that some of the confiscated substances were fake. Dallas Police 
Chief Terrell Bolton said the unidentified informant still works for the 
department and passed a polygraph test after saying he did not know the 
drugs weren't real. The department will not ask to have any of the $200,000 
returned, Bolton said. The department is reviewing its narcotics operation, 
but Bolton said he has no preliminary evidence of departmental wrongdoing. 
If there are any improprieties we will deal with it, he said during a news 
conference Monday afternoon. The informant, whose name was withheld by 
police, assisted in 78 drug buys over the past two years, leading to 35 
arrests.

He was the department's most frequently used informant, said deputy police 
chief John Martinez. Of those arrests, charges against four people were 
dropped after it was revealed the drugs were fake. Charges against five 
others have been downgraded to allegations of distributing simulated drugs. 
The disclosure came after a drug suspect contacted local media with 
complaints that he had been framed by police and that the substance he 
initially was charged with dealing was pulverized sheet rock. Bolton said 
he did not know exactly what the substance was but the fake drugs, a white 
substance packaged in plastic bricks to look like cocaine, could have been 
deadly if inhaled or ingested. It would cause serious illness, damage to 
their lungs and even death, he said. It turned out to be poison rather than 
drugs. A crackdown on U.S. border traffic since the Sept. 11 terrorist 
attacks has made illegal drugs harder to obtain, increasing the likelihood 
of fake substances, Bolton said.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Beth