3 GET PRISON TERMS IN DRUG DIG

Marijuana Case Leaves a Mystery

GREENSBORO - Gary Leslie Causey wept in U.S. District Court on Tuesday
afternoon as he talked about unearthing marijuana from the old Chatham
County landfill in October 2000 to help his disabled father make money.

"My dad was going on this dig, and I went to dig for him," Causey, 39, said
after sipping some water. "I wasn't going to get any of it. Financially I
couldn't help him no more than I already was."

Judge William L. Osteen sentenced Causey, of Snow Camp, to 17 months in
prison and three years of probation for conspiracy to possess and
distribute more than 110 pounds of marijuana. His brother-in-law, James
Benjamin Harris, 36, of Snow Camp, was sentenced to 18 months in prison and
three years of probation, and was ordered to undergo substance abuse
treatment for the same crime. Both men must report to prison by Oct. 15 at
noon.

Jody Mitchell Brafford, 31, of Goldston was sentenced to three years of
probation and 12 successive weekends in jail, and ordered to undergo
substance abuse treatment, complete 360 hours of community service and pay
a $2,500 fine for distributing about 80 pounds of marijuana.

In May, Causey and Harris pleaded guilty to digging up 258 pounds of
marijuana from the landfill one night in October 2000 with David Wayne
Stout, who was convicted by a jury last month; Causey's father, Ted, who
has since died; and a fifth man who hasn't been indicted. Brafford, who
drew a map for the others, pleaded guilty to unearthing marijuana three
times from the same shallow pit.

The defendants' attorneys asked Osteen to consider their clients' crime as
part of a much bigger picture -- that of 5,000 pounds of marijuana evidence
stolen from the Chatham County sheriff. The drugs, which were confiscated
in February 2000 in a sting near Siler City, were stored in an old Army
truck parked behind the sheriff's department. When deputies noticed seven
months later that two tons of the marijuana had been stolen, they enlisted
Brafford, a backhoe driver, to help them bury the remaining one-fifth
undestroyed at the old county landfill.

"Had such a tempting proposition not been presented," attorney Benjamin
Porter said of Brafford, "he wouldn't have gone out of his way to do
something like this. He saw an opportunity to make money."

Though he can't prove it, Thomas Cochran, Harris' attorney, said, "I think
all of us firmly believe that there was someone in the sheriff's department
that made arrangements for [the marijuana] to disappear."

Michael Grace, Causey's attorney, called the defendants "three ... guys who
made a terrible call." Because the marijuana was dumped publicly, it
enticed the men to do something stupid, he said. But the law enforcement
officers entrusted to handle the drugs walked away scot-free, and more than
4,600 pounds of the dope remains unaccounted for, he said.

"This case should not be sentenced in a vacuum," Grace said. "The people
[of Chatham County] are just incensed that this is where it ends up. No one
has a clue where [the marijuana] is."

Osteen, however, said the acts of Chatham County deputies did not diminish
the harshness of the defendants' crimes.

"Everybody knows that if you're going to get and sell marijuana, it's
likely to end up in the hands of children," Osteen said. "Do not expect
this court to take a position that because a law enforcement officer
initiated it, these men are not responsible for their acts."

All three attorneys contended their clients deserved leniency because they
had cooperated fully with the FBI. When Harris was caught trying to sell
about 50 pounds of the marijuana in December 2000, he immediately turned in
his co-conspirators. Then, Harris, Causey and Brafford testified against
Stout at his trial last month. All three wore hidden microphones to trap
other people.

"If Mr. Harris had not said a word, he would be the only one here, and he
would be sentenced under the guidelines for only a few pounds of
marijuana," Cochran said. "And that would be it."

Harris, whose job is burying telephone lines, told the court he regretted
having anything to do with the marijuana. "I did it mainly because of
financial difficulties," he said. "I hope by my cooperation I've done right."

Brafford, a self-employed painter and turkey farmer whose wife is pregnant
with their third child, apologized for the trouble he had caused.

"Your honor, Mr. Brafford is before you remorseful and embarrassed for his
conduct in this case," his attorney said. "But for this particular act,
he's a very upstanding citizen and a hard-working person."

Causey, Grace said, not only helped the FBI with this case, but he provided
"scads of information" to authorities about other drugs in Chatham County
and an unrelated murder.

Harris' and Causey's attorneys maintained that their clients should be
punished for possessing only one-fifth of the entire stash, since the five
men agreed to split the marijuana equally. Osteen, however, ruled that the
men were responsible for all 258 pounds, since they dug, transported,
weighed and agreed to have the drugs cleaned together.

Osteen, who urged anyone in Chatham County who knows about the stolen
marijuana to come forward, said there would probably be many people who
left court Tuesday saying, "Why can law enforcement officers get away with
it and good people can't?"

"I can only deal with those people who come before me and the circumstances
of their case," he said.