DEA OFFICIAL DENIES POLITICS IN DRUG PROBE

The head of the local U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration denied
Friday that political pressure led him to halt the agency's drug
investigation of Houston-based Rap-A-Lot Records.

Ernest Howard made the comment shortly after DEA officials released
e-mails he wrote to the agency's Deputy Administrator Julio Mercado
that imply Howard caved in to high-level political intervention and
dismantled the agency's investigation of the record company in
September 1999.

In a telephone interview Friday, Howard said he was "just blowing off
steam" in the e-mails and he never intended for the messages to be
taken seriously.

The investigation has resulted in drug seizures in Houston, Beaumont
and Oklahoma City and more than 20 convictions against several of
Rap-A-Lot founder James A. Prince's associates -- including a Houston
police officer recently sentenced to prison. Prince, however, has not
been charged.

In a March 15 e-mail to Mercado, Howard plainly states that political
interference influenced the removal of veteran DEA Special Agent Jack
Schumacher from the case and led to the investigation being stopped.

"Now, we bow down to the political pressure anyway," Howard wrote. "If
I had known this I would have never brought (Schumacher) into this
case, nor would I have even pursued it. But it is over now. The
Houston Division will terminate all active investigation of Rap-A-Lot."

Howard said Friday the e-mails were taken out of context.

"My comments do sound as if I wanted to end our involvement with the
case. But you have to understand the context in which (the e-mails)
were written. I was just venting to (Mercado). ... We've been friends
for 25 years, and I was frustrated and needed to get things off my
chest," Howard said.

"Because whenever a law enforcement agency faces an allegation of
impropriety -- whether it's true or false -- there's pressure. I was
concerned about my own people, my investigators, because these things
have a way of getting out of hand and falsely implicating people."

Congressional investigators are examining allegations of political
interference in the DEA's drug investigation of Prince.

Also, Prince has accused the DEA and the Houston Police Department of
using "Gestapo-type tactics" during their 12-year investigation of
Rap-A-Lot.

Howard had confirmed that U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif. -- an
outspoken critic of racial profiling by law enforcement -- sought the
assistance of Attorney General Janet Reno in August 1999 on behalf of
Prince, who said he feared for his life and those of his associates
because of alleged racist police harassment and use of excessive force.

The e-mail correspondence became the focus of the investigation,
partly because it was written days after Vice President Al Gore made a
campaign stop in Houston March 12 at Brookhollow Baptist Church, which
has financial ties to Prince.

A Gore spokesman has denied that the vice president has any
involvement in the matter.

Attorney Michael Hinton, who represented Schumacher during the DEA
internal affairs probe, said he believes Reno may have given orders to
end the case.

Schumacher was exonerated after the agency's internal affairs
division's investigation of Rap-A-Lot case.

"There's something very amiss here," Hinton said. "Someone higher up
shut down this investigation. And I don't doubt for an instant that
James Prince's money and political connections had something to do
with it.

"Howard is a wonderful guy, but it's ludicrous for him to claim he
hasn't actively worked to end the investigation," Hinton said. "But I
strongly suspect he buckled to an enormous amount of political
pressure from above."

In a letter to Reno, Waters mentioned that Schumacher had been
investigated for his involvement in six fatal police shootings. Reno's
letter was eventually passed on to the DEA's internal affairs division.

Although the DEA determined the shootings were justified, Schumacher,
who led the Rap-A-Lot case through more than 20 convictions and
cocaine seizures, was transferred to a desk job.

Howard insisted at the time of the transfer that Waters' letter to the
Justice Department played no part in Schumacher's reassignment.

Howard emphatically denied making any attempt to end the investigation
but did acknowledge that his investigators "pulled back" and quit
pursuing the case as aggressively as they had. He also said he never
approached HPD about withdrawing its assistance in the case.

But in September 1999, HPD officials maintain, Howard did ask the
department to remove its seven local officers from the investigation.
The department currently has no organized drug investigation against
Prince, HPD spokesman Robert Hurst said Friday

The House Government Reform Committee said the next step in its
inquiry is to interview DEA employees affiliated with the case to
determine what went wrong.

"We're still in a very early stage of the investigation -- and we're
obviously getting conflicting reports about the status of the
investigation," said Kevin Binger, committee staff director. "Our main
concern is to see to it that law enforcement agencies are able to do
their job without having political pressure applied to them."

In a written statement released Friday, the DEA said it would
cooperate fully with the congressional committee and has voluntarily
turned over all requested documents.

"If any individual in the DEA is found to have allowed political
pressure to interfere with a legitimate law enforcement investigation,
he or she would be held accountable ... through the DEA disciplinary
process," according to the statement.