Pubdate: Sat, 15 Nov 2003 Source: Dallas Morning News (TX) Copyright: 2003 The Dallas Morning News Contact: http://www.dallasnews.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/117 Author: ROBERT THARP, and MATT STILES, The Dallas Morning News FAKE-DRUG TRIAL WITNESS WEEPS He Describes Arrest, Saying Ex-Detective's Statements Were False Victor Alvarado wept at the witness stand Friday, telling jurors about what he said were false statements by a narcotics detective that led to his arrest two years ago on charges of selling cocaine. The 26-year-old father of three is one of at least two dozen victims of bogus drug busts in 2001 involving former Dallas detective Mark Delapaz, prosecutors said. Mr. Alvarado is the second of four expected to testify in the federal criminal trial, which began Wednesday. Mr. Delapaz, who defense attorneys have said is an honest officer who was duped by a group of crooked confidential informants, is accused of lying in arrest warrant affidavits and to prosecutors when he said he saw people involved in transactions of what he believed to be drugs. The white powdery substance actually was pool chalk. Nearing the end of his 90 minutes of testimony Friday, Mr. Alvarado began to cry, his face turning red as he reached for tissue and talked about the effect of his arrest on himself and his family. "They were accusing me of selling drugs," Mr. Alvarado said through a court interpreter. "I never sold anything." He told jurors how uniformed police officers descended on an Old East Dallas auto repair shop where he and a friend were retrieving tools for a construction job. Mr. Alvarado said he had no idea what was happening that day in April 2001, but he was quickly taken behind the business at East Grand and Fitzhugh avenues and strip-searched. In an arrest warrant, Mr. Delapaz stated that he observed a confidential informant give Mr. Alvarado $2,500 in marked money in exchange for a clear plastic bag containing drugs. Mr. Alvarado and two other witnesses testified Friday that the events described never happened. The Dallas Police Department's marked money for the purchase was never recovered. Asked why he had named Mr. Delapaz in a civil lawsuit asking for $2.5 million, Mr. Alvarado said: "He's the one who was doing all that against me." Prosecutors contend that Mr. Alvarado was one of the first victims in the informants' fake-drug scheme. In his case, the informants created the fake drug bust with the intention of stealing the drug-purchase money supplied to them by the Police Department, prosecutors say. Later, according to testimony, the informants grew bolder and began fabricating large amounts of fake drugs to plant on innocent victims. The seizures grew because the informants were promised $1,000 for every kilogram of narcotics they could help police seize, prosecutors said. Mr. Delapaz is not accused of taking part in the conspiracy to arrest innocent people, but prosecutors charge that plan could not have happened without the officer's false statements about witnessing the transactions in police reports and to county prosecutors. Those fictitious reports amount to a violation of the victims' constitutional rights against false arrest, according to the charge. Federal prosecutors also charged him with lying to an FBI agent. He faces 10 years in prison if convicted. In testimony earlier Friday, Vanessa Gwyn said Mr. Delapaz returned her telephone call on Sept. 17, 2001, several days after he had arrested her mother. The call came after Mr. Delapaz had learned that a kilo of the drugs confiscated during Yvonne Gwyn's arrest had tested as fake, according to testimony. Still, her daughter told jurors, Mr. Delapaz urged her to have her mother talk to police. "He basically told me that ... she needed to come clean, and if she didn't, she would spend the rest of her life in jail," the daughter testified. Lab officials later discovered that another 29 kilos found in a car at Ms. Gwyn's auto shop also were fake. The trial, which could last until mid-December, resumes Monday morning. - --- MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart