FAKE-DRUG LAWSUIT TARGETS SUPERVISORS

Bolton, 2 Commanders Named In Filing Citing Lax Police Oversight

Plaintiffs in a federal civil-rights lawsuit stemming from faulty drug
arrests have added Dallas Police Chief Terrell Bolton and two other
commanders to the list of defendants, court papers show.

The motion, filed Friday on behalf of nine people whose drug cases were
dismissed, seeks to add the police chief, Deputy Chief Bill Turnage and
Deputy Chief John Martinez to the lawsuit, which had previously named the
city and two narcotics officers. The complaint cites lax supervision of the
officers by the department.

Mark Goldstucker, assistant city attorney, said the city will dispute the
claims of supervisory failure and deliberate indifference.

"That's simply not the case," he said. "There's more to it than when did
somebody know something and what did they do about it."

Background Coverage of the ongoing investigation from The Dallas Morning
News and WFAA.

Chief Bolton said he could not comment on pending litigation. Chiefs
Turnage and Martinez could not be reached for comment.

Also on Friday, U.S. Attorney Jane Boyle announced that the Department of
Justice had advised her office to recuse itself from the pending FBI
investigation into the arrests. The review by the Justice Department came
at Ms. Boyle's request.

Prosecution of the case has been turned over to the Justice Department's
criminal section of the civil-rights division, according to a news release.
Officials said that details about the recusal would not be discussed
because of the pending investigation.

The new complaint, citing "a complete breakdown in supervision," said
Chiefs Martinez and Turnage, formerly a narcotics unit lieutenant, did not
take preventive measures despite many "red flags and warning signs." The
complaint said the warning signs began when drug evidence that had tested
positive in the field was determined in later tests not to be illegal
substances. Chief Turnage was promoted the following month after his
narcotics division unit had a string of record busts.

The complaint said that instead of asking questions, the supervisors
continued for weeks to authorize record cash payments to questionable
informants after additional cases involving fake drugs were found. That led
to prolonged jail time for those wrongly accused and led to more
unnecessary arrests, the filing said.

Mr. Goldstucker said civil-rights case law requires that the plaintiffs
prove the city's policies and practices as a whole - not actions by
individual supervisors - resulted in constitutional violations for which
taxpayers would be required to pay damages.

"I can't go into specifics about dates and times and who knew what and
when," Mr. Goldstucker said. "But what I can tell you is it's the city's
position that there was no policy or practice that resulted in
constitutional violations that the plaintiffs allege."

The Dallas County district attorney's office has identified more than 80
Dallas police narcotics cases tainted after the fake-drug cases surfaced
Dec. 31. About two dozen cases involved fake or no drugs, and others were
dismissed because of questions surrounding Senior Cpl. Mark Delapaz,
Officer Eddie Herrera and their paid informants.

The complaint filed with the motion to expand the lawsuit Friday also said
Chief Bolton did not place any officers on routine paid suspension for
weeks after Nov. 30, when he said an internal investigation had been
ordered. He placed the officers on paid leave Jan. 15.

The plaintiffs said Chief Turnage shouldn't have had command of the street
narcotics squad when the city "had actual notice of previous supervisory
concerns."

In 1994, Chief Turnage served as a shift supervisor over a group of
officers in the southeast substation who were fired or disciplined that
year for too zealously pursuing drug dealers. Three officers were
disciplined for allegations such as illegally entering and searching
apartments.

In a previous response to the lawsuit, Cpl. Delapaz and Officer Herrera
said they followed orders from their supervisors to continue making drug
busts with the informant after they were told a polygraph test had cleared him.

On Friday, the number of drug cases dismissed by the Dallas County district
attorney's office reached 80 when four more cases were thrown out.

Staff writers Robert Tharp and Tim Wyatt contributed to this report.