Dallas settling fake-drug lawsuits - Police Sold Fake Drugs to Latino Men

The city of Dallas has agreed to settle at least four of the nine federal civil-rights lawsuits stemming from the fake-drug scandal. The monetary payouts to those plaintiffs four Hispanic men falsely arrested in 2001 were not disclosed Tuesday. All of the cases were scheduled for trials in the next several months. The agreements are a signal that most, if not all, of the remaining lawsuits could soon be settled. That would close another chapter in the embarrassing 2001 scandal in which more than two-dozen innocent people went to jail based on bogus drug evidence. Court records show that settlement talks continue in several of the remaining lawsuits. They generally accuse the city and former police officials involved in the series of bogus arrests of civil-rights violations or of creating an environment that allowed them. "We've made significant progress," City Attorney Madeline Johnson said Tuesday, declining to comment specifically about the settlements. "I'm confident that we will bring closure to most of those cases in the near future." The cost of any settlements related to the scandal would be made public once all the deals are finalized, she said. Two of the four settlements, handled by plaintiff's attorney Tony Wright of Dallas, were disclosed in federal court records. Mr. Wright confirmed Tuesday that his clients in two other cases also had reached agreements with the city.

• FAKE DRUGS , real lives: Dallas Police Department officials initially proclaimed 2001 a banner year for drug busts, reportedly seizing 1,440 pounds of cocaine and 238 pounds of methamphetamine with an estimated street value of $65 million. An investigation however, discovered that nearly half the cocaine and a quarter of the methamphetamine seizures contained little or no illegal drugs. Through extensive interviews while tracking lab results and court records, WFAA-TV found that a key ingredient in at least several seizures was gypsum, the main component of Sheetrock.
  
• The suspects in the "fake drug" cases often were curiously similar. Most were recent Mexican immigrants working as auto mechanics or day laborers; few spoke English or had prior criminal records. Often, the alleged drugs were found in duffel or trash bags inside vehicles parked at auto shops or loaned to the suspect.Many suspects only learned that they faced drug charges days after their arrests. Most, if not all, claimed to have never seen the alleged drugs; several passed polygraphs when asked if they knew about the seized items. [more]