'BANANA STORY HARD TO SWALLOW'

WORCESTER-- A state trooper's apparent inability to distinguish between a
banana and a firearm led to a cocaine-trafficking charge against a Lawrence
man and a cry of foul from the defense lawyer in a recent court hearing.

On the night of March 14, while on patrol on Interstate 290, Trooper Jamie
Vitale stopped a commercial van for speeding. As he approached the van, he
said, he saw a fidgety front-seat passenger reach toward the floor and make
a motion as if tossing an object under the seat behind him.

Because part of the van was in the travel lane, the trooper knocked on the
passenger-side window, and the passenger rolled it down. Trooper Vitale
said he saw that the passenger was not wearing a seat belt.

The trooper asked the driver for his license and registration, and the
driver showed his license, but had no registration.

The passenger, when asked for identification, produced a Social Security
card identifying himself as Pablo Paulina.

The trooper said the passenger appeared to be extremely nervous, breathing
heavily, sweating and shaking. Because Trooper Vitale was concerned for his
own safety, he said, he asked the passenger to leave the van and
pat-frisked him for weapons.

Finding none, the trooper returned to the vehicle and looked inside. He
found a black garbage bag partially tied off.

And there lay the test of the trooper's ability to separate fruit from firearm.

Trooper Vitale picked up the bag, felt that it contained several hard
objects, and looked inside the partially secured opening. Moving what
appeared to be paper towels revealed a white, rock-like substance, like
cocaine, wrapped in a clear plastic bag.

Trooper Vitale issued the driver a warning for speeding and having no
registration in his possession; he arrested the passenger on a charge of
cocaine trafficking. Fingerprints during the booking procedure showed the
suspect to be Leon-Pena Serso, 28, of Lawrence, rather than the man whose
name appeared on the Social Security card.

Some time later, Mr. Serso's lawyer, John J. Roemer, filed a motion to
suppress the seizure of the drugs as unlawful, claiming the search of the
bag in the van was without legal justification.

Assistant District Attorney Donald H. Progen argued that the evidence was
properly seized during a justified search for weapons.

After a hearing in Worcester Superior Court a few days ago, Judge James P.
Donohue denied the motion to suppress. But neither the dispute nor the case
is likely to conclude there.

During the hearing, Trooper Vitale testified that when he picked up the
trash bag, he felt what he believed to be a small handgun and a box of
ammunition inside. As it turned out, he said, the items were a hard green
banana and the block of cocaine.

Mr. Roemer's memorandum of law in support of his motion to suppress was
subtitled: "Even a Child Knows the Difference Between a Gun anda Banana."

"The police practice of frisking and detaining ethnic minorities, upon the
flimsiest pretenses, has become a scandal in the Commonwealth," the
memorandum began.

"The rationale for the search of the plastic bag in this case was that the
bag held a banana; that Trooper Vitale cannot tell the difference between a
handgun and a banana; and that the courts of the Commonwealth share the
trooper's difficulties on this issue," the defense lawyer said.

"The appearance of the banana comes late in the history ofthis case," Mr.
Roemer continued. "There was no documentation ofit at the police barracks.
There was no mention of it in the police report. The banana made its first
public appearance at the motion hearing on Oct. 3. A discerning mind could
well believe that October was too late in the season for this banana
credibly to appear."

Trooper Vitale's professed inability to tell the difference between the
fruit and a firearm "would require a triumph over obvious facts," according
to Mr. Roemer.

"The trooper knows (because he wears one) that a gun has ahammer, a trigger
and a loading mechanism: a square magazine in the case of an automatic; a
cylinder in the case of a revolver. The fanciest banana lacks these
improvements," the defense lawyer wrote.

Bananas "have smooth, soft skins (even when the fruit is green) that taper
into stems, advantages that guns lack," Mr. Roemer pointed out