BANKRUPTCY AND BOGUS DRUGS EVOKE AIR OF 'SADNESS'

From the Bart Simpson "I didn't do it" school of ducking personal
responsibility, we have a new Texas trend.

It turns out that real men, when enveloped in scandal, don't admit
mistakes. They don't apologize. Instead, they express sadness.

Kenneth Lay, former chairman of the Houston-based Enron Corp., is sad.
At least that is what Mr. Lay told members of a U.S. Senate committee
this week in response to a subpoena.

Mr. Lay was summoned to offer some insight into the largest corporate
bankruptcy in U.S. history. Instead, he offered only lament.

"I have come here with a profound sadness about what has happened to
Enron, its current and former employees, retirees, shareholders and
other stakeholders," Mr. Lay told committee members - before invoking
his Fifth Amendment right not to testify.

In Dallas, there also is a sadness in the air - only not about a
corporate bankruptcy but about what looks like a law-and-order
breakdown over bogus drugs.

You know the story. Six hundred pounds of them confiscated by police
were used by the district attorney's office to chalk up dozens of
criminal convictions. When prosecutors discovered that a powdery
substance believed to be cocaine really was ground gypsum, it
dismissed - or began pursuing dismissals for - more than 70 pending
and adjudicated drug cases against dozens of individuals.

Lives were turned upside down, jobs lost, families strained, and good
names ruined. Worse, since many of the victims were Mexican immigrants
- - some legal, some not - the word is out to predators that immigrants
are easy prey for all manner of crimes. It is open season.

About this, Dallas County District Attorney Bill Hill is, well,
sad.

At least that is what Mr. Hill told ABC News' Chris Bury during an
interview on Nightline this week. When Mr. Bury asked the district
attorney if he felt he owed those who were falsely imprisoned a
personal and public apology, Mr. Hill first expressed doubt that all
of the individuals involved in the dismissed drug cases were, in fact,
innocent.

He must have missed the first part of the show. It was centered on a
report by WFAA-TV reporter Brett Shipp that did a pretty good job of
establishing "reasonable doubt" about the guilt of most of the accused.

Mr. Bury pressed on. He asked Mr. Hill: If it turned out that just one
person was wrongly imprisoned, would he apologize? Again, Mr. Hill resisted.

But he did lay claim to some sorrow: "I certainly feel very saddened
by the fact that anyone was placed in jail and ...[was] innocent of
the charges."

The district attorney then offered assurances that he had improved the
procedure so something like this wouldn't happen again.

One can't blame Mr. Hill for not being eager to throw himself on this
grenade. After all, his office is just one part of the law-and-order
puzzle. Prosecutors took it on faith that the drug tests administered
by police were legitimate, and they got suckered by a deceptive
informant, dirty cops or both.

But prosecutors are - like it or not - in a 50-50 partnership with
police, and so they deserve not only half of the credit when things go
right but also half of the blame when they go wrong.

It was the district attorney's office that pursued the convictions -
and did so for four months after learning the drugs were fake.

And it was the district attorney's office that drew the clearest
political benefit from those convictions - at least to the degree that
they fed voter confidence that tough-on-crime prosecutors, and those
who supervised them, were keeping drugs off the streets. That
confidence is measured at the ballot box, where it is voters who
decide whether district attorneys keep their jobs.

In fact, Dallas County voters soon will make that call with regard to
Bill Hill, who is up for re-election.

Mr. Hill strikes me as a straight shooter, and I take him at his word
that he wants to ensure that things are done right from here. And,
with that in mind, a personal and public apology to the victims is the
right thing to do.

But it shouldn't come from Mr. Hill alone. Police Chief Terrell Bolton
and City Manager Ted Benavides - whose office supervises the Police
Department - also must step up and accept their share of blame for
this debacle. They, too, have a lot for which to apologize.

Not all at once, gentlemen. You all will get your turn.

The Mexican consulate in Dallas now is quietly introducing the victims
to local lawyers, setting the stage for what surely will be a
multimillion-dollar civil suit against both the Police Department and
the district attorney's office.

It is a lesson that Mr. Lay should heed, too: When confronted with a
sad state of affairs, those who resist taking their fair share of
responsibility sometimes end up having it assigned to them.