OURAY DRUG CASE UNDER FIRE

Wednesday, June 27, 2001 - Defense attorneys in a 1999 Ouray County drug
case lashed out at the government Tuesday in federal court, saying kingpins
were given sweetheart deals in exchange for testimony against their seven
clients, who are small-time users.

But assistant U.S. Attorney Dan Cassidy told the jury during opening
statements that the methamphetamine ring had penetrated all corners of the
community, from a former undersheriff and a former deputy clear down to
waitresses on Main Street.

Of the 19 people indicted two years ago for conspiracy to distribute
methamphetamine in the rugged, mountainous county in southwestern Colorado,
12 have pleaded to charges or had them dismissed.

Seven defendants, including former Undersheriff John Radcliff and former
sheriff's deputy Leroy Todd, chose to argue their cases before a jury,
which was seated Monday night for an expected three-week trial, presided
over by U.S. District Judge Edward Nottingham.

Cassidy said the two officers took advantage of their positions and stayed
abreast of arrests and drug stops by their access to police communications.

He even accused Todd of having sex with kingpin Perry Wherley's girlfriend,
Alicia Davis, while waiting for another deputy to return to the trailer
with a search warrant. He said Todd then allowed Davis to ransack the
trailer before the warrant was served.

Attorney Tom Hammond, representing defendant Kim Hojnowski, told the jury
the methamphetamine ring got started when Wherley and his friend Brenda
Paul began dealing in order to pay for a house they wanted to build.

The two had a falling out, Hammond said, and Paul was suspected of ratting
on Wherley. Wherley's sister, Lisa Radcliff, the wife of the undersheriff,
was a heavy user, Hammond said, and went to the cops about Paul.

"This was a family that turned on each other," he said. "And the biggest
fish are now the government's witnesses."

Wherley, Paul and Lisa Radcliff have pleaded guilty to distribution charges
and are awaiting sentencing. The length of their sentences will be
determined by how well they cooperate with the government, prosecutors said.

Ouray County Sheriff Dominic Mattivi, who was a deputy in 1997, testified
that he and another deputy went to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation in
March 1998 to report suspected drug dealing by deputies. They did so
without telling Sheriff Jerry Wakefield or Undersheriff Radcliff.