VICTIMS IN TAINTED STING WIN SETTLEMENT

Amarillo, Texas, Will Pay $5 Million to the 45 People Wrongly Jailed in a
Raid in Nearby Tulia.

Victims of a discredited 1999 drug sting in the Texas panhandle town of
Tulia will receive a $5-million settlement from the nearby city of
Amarillo, attorneys announced Thursday.

Two women who were swept up in the early morning raid, which civil rights
groups said was racially motivated, brought a lawsuit last year. Amarillo -
the lead city in the regional narcotics task force involved - is the first
government entity to settle. The money will be divided among 45 people - 37
of them black - who were wrongly arrested. Thirty-five of those convicted
later were pardoned by Texas Gov. Rick Perry.

"This is a big day for the case and a big day for our clients, and we think
it will bring closure to the injustice that happened in Tulia," said Vanita
Gupta, a lawyer for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund who helped
win the release of the Tulia prisoners last summer.

Under the settlement, Amarillo will dismantle the drug task force that
oversaw the activities of a rogue undercover agent, Tom Coleman. Coleman,
who is white, worked alone and used no audio or video surveillance. His
uncorroborated testimony later was found to be so unreliable that a Texas
judge said it would be "a travesty of justice to permit the convictions to
stand."

Coleman will face perjury charges at a trial in May.

Given the "egregious facts in the case," Amarillo had no choice but to
settle, City Atty. Marcus W. Norris said in a phone interview. "We could
not begin to defend what happened here."

Texas law is unclear on who is legally responsible when a multiagency task
force runs amok, Norris said. But since Amarillo was the main participant,
its liability could have exceeded $50 million, he said.

"We're not Houston or Dallas. Had we received an adverse jury verdict, it
would have been devastating for Amarillo, and we could not take that
financial gamble. Once we begin explaining some of the facts that would
have come into trial, [the settlement] is a very rational decision, albeit
a pill," Norris said.

A claims administrator will divide the money by looking at factors such as
length of time spent in jail and harm suffered by the criminal proceedings,
Gupta said. Most of the Tulia victims were jailed between one and four
years. Others received probation or had the charges dismissed. Mediation is
ongoing with 26 counties and the other three cities named in the lawsuit.

Since their release from prison, most of the raid's victims have stayed in
Tulia because of family ties, Gupta said. "We're encouraging the clients to
move out, but that's easier said than done. Now they have the resources to
reassess whether they want to stay in a town with no thriving economy. [The
settlement money] may help them look at their lives with more room for
opportunity," she said.

Former Tulia inmate Kizzie White, 26, said the money would help but it was
"still not going to bring back the four years I missed out with my kids."

"I still think about what happened," said White, a home healthcare
provider. "When I was in jail, it was like a nightmare. It helps to know
that people realize they made a mistake. Hopefully it won't happen again."