1989 COCAINE CONVICT EYES SUPERVISORS SEAT

M ONTROSS -- The last time Lynn C. Brownley made headlines, he was
surrendering his job as county prosecutor and being convicted of
felony cocaine possession.

A videotape at his trial showed the then-35-year-old Westmoreland
County commonwealth's attorney chopping a small, white lump of the
drug on a hand-held mirror and then snorting it through a straw into his nose.

"I saw the straw and the mirror and I couldn't resist," Brownley told
the judge during his trial.

Now, 18 years later, Brownley is running for a seat on the
Westmoreland Board of Supervisors.

He says he's drug-free, in touch with God and ready to serve again in
a county that has been his home all 53 of his years. Then-Gov. Mark
R. Warner restored his voting rights in 2003, so he can now run for
office despite the felony conviction.

"My whole life has been pretty much an open book around here,"
Brownley said this week. "I didn't try to redeem myself for a board
of supervisors race, but I've tried to be involved in making a
difference in things."

Brownley is running as a Democrat against Bonnie B. Chandler, a
Republican, in the race for the county's District 3 board seat. The
board appointed her to the seat in December to fill the vacancy left
by Robert Wittman, who resigned after being elected to the General
Assembly. The winner will serve the remaining one year in the term.
Judging by the number of campaign signs in yards, the race could be close.

Some people are ready to see Brownley, a College of William and Mary
honor graduate and once-promising attorney, rejoin pubic life. Others
are not ready to forgive.

"He committed a very serious breach of the public trust," said Robert
R. Fountain, the Westmoreland County Republican Committee chairman,
who has been especially outspoken about Brownley's candidacy. "I'm
hoping the public will think through the question well before they vote."

But James E. White, a local gunsmith, who declined to say how he
plans to vote, said there is no reason to keep Brownley ostracized.

"I think he's paid dear for what he did," he said. Brownley's
conviction "ought to be put behind him, and let the man get on with his life."

Brownley said recently that he had become addicted to cocaine by the
time a three-month-long state police investigation culminated with
his arrest on May 25, 1988.

Testimony and the tape from a police video camera hidden in a
Montross hotel room revealed the depth of his addiction.

The tape shows Brownley meeting a police informant who posed as a
prospective legal client but eventually offered to sell him the drug
at a Montross motel. Brownley told the man, "Give me something now
[expletive]. If you don't . . . I'm going to put you in jail, and
I'll keep on putting you in jail."

A few minutes later, Brownley walked out of the room with almost 4
grams of cocaine and into the hands of police officers. At his Jan.
3, 1989, trial, Brownley was convicted of cocaine possession and
ordered to spend every weekend for the next six months in the county jail.

Brownley said the stress of a failing marriage and the demands of
16-hour days working as county prosecutor and county attorney and in
his own private practice led to cocaine use.

He has petitioned the Virginia State Bar to reinstate his license to
practice law. The bar's disciplinary board, citing Brownley's threat
to lock up the informant if he didn't sell him cocaine, has refused.

Chandler said she has not made Brownley's conviction an issue in her campaign.

"I have a real desire to fill this seat," she said. "There are a lot
of changes going on in Westmoreland. I think I can be a very good
representative."

Chandler, who farmed with her husband before becoming office manager
at the Mid-Rivers Cancer Center in Montross in February, shares some
of Brownley's concerns about the county's future.

The rural county, which once relied on farming, fishing and forestry
for its economy, is now attracting more and more developers seeking
windfall profits on the waterfront housing boom.

She said the county needs to find ways to make farming lucrative
enough to keep developers at bay.

Brownley, who works as a legal and business consultant, says the
board should have taken such steps months ago. Supervisors have
approved nearly 1,000 building lots in the past year, used tax money
to help extend sewers into areas that will be developed, and
considered financing a community development authority to help
developers pay the cost of roads, water systems and other infrastructure.

"People want slow development," Brownley said. "They feel the board
is overly subdivision-friendly."