Pubdate: Wed, 22 Mar 2006
Source: Berkshire Eagle, The (Pittsfield, MA)
Contact:  2006 New England Newspapers, Inc.
Website: http://www.berkshireeagle.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/897
Author: Nicole  Sequino, Berkshire Eagle Staff
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Cannabis)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?199 (Mandatory Minimum Sentencing)

LATEST CASE INVOLVING '04 DRUG SWEEP

PITTSFIELD - An undercover police officer testified yesterday that he 
purchased just over a gram of marijuana from an 18-year-old Otis man 
- - one of 19 people arrested in a controversial drug sweep in Great 
Barrington in 2004. Mitchell Lawrence, of West Center Road, faces 
single counts of distribution of marijuana, possession of marijuana 
and committing a drug violation within a drug-free school zone 
stemming from the alleged drug sale. The school-zone charge, the 
center of the controversy, carries a minimum two-year jail sentence 
if the drug sale took place within 1,000 feet of a school or park. 
The undercover operation from January to September 2004 led to the 
arrest of Lawrence and 18 others accused of selling cocaine, 
marijuana and other drugs from a Great Barrington parking lot.

The Concerned Citizens for Appropriate Justice, a neighborhood group 
formed in Great Barrington, has called on District Attorney David F. 
Capeless to drop the school-zone charges against defendants, such as 
Lawrence, who are charged  with selling small amounts of marijuana. 
Capeless has stated that his office  will continue to prosecute 
school-zone charges in any applicable case. During testimony 
yesterday in Berkshire Superior Court, former Pittsfield Police 
Officer Felix A. Aguirre told Assistant District Attorney Robert W. 
Kinzer III that he was working undercover for the Berkshire County 
Drug Task Force during the summer 2004 to investigate neighbors' 
complaints of drug activities at the former Taconic Lumber parking 
lot. Aguirre now works for the Springfield Police Department as a patrolman.

On June 30, 2004, Aguirre said Lawrence offered to sell him marijuana 
while they were idling in the parking lot.

"He asked me if I wanted any 'smoke,' and he said he had a 20," said 
Aguirre, referring to street talk for $20 worth of marijuana. "I 
said, 'Let's take a walk,' since no one buys in the open."

They walked down Elm Street near First Congregational Church, where 
Aguirre said that Lawrence sold him an individually wrapped package 
of 1.12 grams of marijuana - about the size of a quarter. Aguirre 
identified Lawrence in a police  photo array on July 23, 2004.

Kinzer pointed out that the church houses the Great Barrington 
Cooperative Preschool, which makes the alleged drug sale a 
school-zone violation. Lawrence's attorney, Richard M. Simons of 
Pittsfield, countered that nothing outside the church indicates that 
a preschool operates there. Eugene P. Galvani Jr., a longtime land 
surveyor, told Kinzer that he found the locations where Aguirre said 
the sale took place fell between 426 and 556 feet from the preschool, 
well within 1,000 feet for the school-zone charge. Simons attempted 
to discredit Galvani's testimony. He pointed out that Galvani first 
met with Aguirre at the site on Oct. 27, 2004, but did not take 
measurements until Nov. 16, 2004. Kinzer countered that Galvani had 
marked the site with metal spikes, which were untouched when he 
returned to the site to measure. In his cross-examination of Aguirre, 
Simons asked whether Aguirre intentionally led Lawrence to a 
school-zone area; Aguirre denied knowing that  the sting operation 
even involved school-zone cases at first.

The trial is set to continue today at 9 a.m. with Simons further 
questioning Aguirre. Twelve cases from the sting operation are 
pending, while a handful of cases have reached plea agreements.

Kyle Sawin, 18, of Otis, has been the only defendant in the drug 
sweep freed of the charges. A Berkshire Superior Court jury found 
Sawin not guilty on Sept.  23, 2005, after being tried twice on 
charges of selling marijuana in a drug-free  school zone. His first 
trial ended in a mistrial when the jury could not reach a  verdict.

Sawin's mother attended Lawrence's trial  yesterday.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom