GOWDY TRIES TO CUT DOWN DRUG LOAD

The number of pending drug cases - by far the single largest segment
of Seventh Circuit Solicitor Trey Gowdy's 6,000-case backlog - is
about to go down.

Gowdy has taken the offensive against drug cases, arranging special
sessions of court to resolve them and personally evaluating each of
the 1,478 pending charges in his office. The case folders daily
wheeled into his office on a trolley range from the most serious
charges, trafficking in kilo amounts of cocaine or methamphetamine,
down to marijuana possession beefs punishable by no more than six
months in jail.

The solicitor already has held one week of court devoted exclusively
to drug cases. He has two more planned next month.

"Drug cases take up about a third of our total docket, and as many as
50 new ones come in every week," Gowdy said. "We needed to focus our
attention on them because the cases get a lot weaker as they get older."

Drug cases often are reliant on prosecution witnesses with drug
histories or pending charges of their own, Gowdy explained, and they
rarely include fingerprint or DNA evidence.

"They're testimony-reliant," he said. "In many cases, we have to move
quickly so memories don't fade or witnesses become unavailable. You
can't ask an officer to remember where passengers in a vehicle were
seated and where drugs were found if a case is years old."

Yet some of the 550 cases Gowdy said his office has disposed of since
the new initiative began last month dated to 2001 or earlier.

"Drug cases sometimes can get set aside if you have a limited amount
of court time and murders and armed robberies to try," he said. "And
sometimes witnesses can't be found. There are many reasons a case gets
old.

"But now we have a team of three prosecutors and myself who are
operating under one philosophy, under my direction. We will get to the
point where all drug cases are disposed of within five or six months."

The solicitor said he had to dismiss some of the charges he evaluated.

"In one case, the witnesses were in Bosnia, and we can't afford to fly
them here for a drug case," he said. "Some defendants had died since
their cases were made."

A federal prosecutor for six years before he was elected in 2000,
Gowdy said he prosecuted more than 500 drug cases in U.S. District
Court.

Circuit Judge Larry Patterson heard most of the cases moved last week,
which Gowdy devoted to drug cases.

Patterson acknowledged that he gave many probationary sentences last
week, but he said those were in cases of first-offenders facing simple
possession charges. He said the new drug initiative, in order to work,
will require the cooperation of judges and defense attorneys.

"I believe that, working this way, we're going to make tremendous
progress getting the docket caught up," the judge said.

Defense attorney Andy Johnston took about a dozen clients before
Patterson last week. Each one pleaded guilty, in some cases to reduced
charges.

"The majority of my cases were relatively old," said Johnston, a
former prosecutor. "The judge was very reasonable, and a large number
of cases were moved.

"This is an effective way to address drug cases."