TULIA RESIDENT TULIA FARMER DUG IN HEELS FOR JUSTICE

If someone makes a movie about the 1999 Tulia drug bust, Gary Gardner said,
it has to be done as a comedy.

This outspoken 57-year-old farmer and crop-duster is pretty much the fellow
who got the justice ball rolling in Tulia, after he saw how the drug bust
was conducted and how those arrested were being treated.

While Tulia is a small town, any movie about the drug bust would need a
pretty large cast, considering there were 46 people arrested and 38
convictions -- all based on the word of one undercover cop. And considering
there were about a dozen law firms, mostly from Washington, New York City
and California, that donated about a million bucks worth of time and
expenses to get those convictions overturned.

Gardner said he enjoyed meeting those big-city lawyers and that he believes
Tulia "was the adventure of a lifetime for them. They've never seen or
dealt with people like me. Everybody in Swisher County is larger than life.
Everybody's a cartoon character. I'm a cartoon character."

Laying down a foundation Before the legion of lawyers came to Tulia,
Gardner had helped to put down some pretty good foundation stones. He did a
whole lot of digging into the facts. He educated himself on pertinent legal
aspects by driving 90 miles to the law school library in Lubbock the first
couple of years before learning about an Internet site where the same
information could be found. He wrote a 150-page writ for one of the defendants.

A man who grows up working land in the Panhandle country, fighting the wind
and the cold and the dry, develops a special degree of determination.
Something needs doing, he figures out how he can do it. May not be like
anyone else does it, but if he can make it work.

Well, like when Gardner was working as a mechanic over in Amarillo, after
going there to attend junior college for about six months. He said he was
ready to get married but didn't often have an opportunity to meet girls in
that job and felt that he couldn't make much of an impression because of
the sweat and grime that went with that line of work.

So he joined the highway patrol. Spent six months in training. Got
stationed in the nearby town of Canadian. Looked pretty good in that
uniform and patrol car and, sure enough, on Jan. 1, 1970, he got married
and resigned.

So in 1999, when he saw how drug-busted people were being treated, and how
the charges were based on the word of one lone, itinerant lawman working
undercover for the regional narcotics task force, Gardner began to research
and write letters and talk to reporters and to legislators. And he has kept
it up for four years.

One thing he's noticed through it all, he said Tuesday, is how so many
little pieces had to fall into place, how one link sometimes unexpectedly
led to another in the unusual chain of events.

For example, because of some opinions expressed in a letter he had written
to the local newspaper, the original judge in the case was recused from the
pivotal evidentiary hearing held a few weeks ago. Gardner said the judge's
letter was responding to a letter Gardner had written to the paper.

The pinch-hitting judge found that the undercover cop's testimony was so
unreliable that he is recommending all 38 convictions be overturned -- even
those of people who had been coerced into accepting plea bargains.

Work is actually paying off Thirteen people remain locked up, waiting for
the paperwork to get to the Court of Criminal Appeals, where the high
judges will decide whether to follow the recommendation.

Meanwhile, a measure known as the Tulia Bill is being considered by our
lawmakers in Austin. If it passes, no one could be convicted on the
uncorroborated word of a single undercover cop. Also, an amendment to the
budget bill would eliminate funding for all the state's narcotics task forces.

Gardner said that what he's been working for is just about accomplished,
and after all the people finally are released and the convictions
officially overturned, then maybe someone will make a movie.

"It could be a real good show, too," he said. "Mixing comedy and tragedy.
Laughing and crying at the same time."