HPD ACCUSED OF RIGHTS VIOLATIONS

Records Reveal Warrantless Searches In Drug Investigations

The city's zero-tolerance policy in high-crime areas has led to
repeated civil rights abuses as poorly trained police officers target
suspects based on physical appearance in an effort to make cases,
according to court documents, a former police official and a federal
judge.

A study of 5,000 offense reports filed by the Southwest Gang Task
Force from 1994 to 1999 revealed no search warrants were issued in any
of the 432 drug-related investigations it conducted, according to
court documents. Those figures include traffic stops, pedestrian stops
and entries to dwellings -- including the apartment of Pedro Oregon
Navarro.

Documents and testimony in depositions from top current and former
police and city officials about events leading up to Oregon's 1998
police shooting death provide a disturbing view of policies and
procedures that are a road map for tragedy.

Former Houston Police Chief Sam Nuchia -- now a 1st Court of Appeals
justice -- acknowledged gang task-force officers were directed to "go
to the line, into the gray area" in searches, seizures and arrests of
suspects when he formed the group in 1994, according to his deposition
in a lawsuit filed by Oregon's family.

But officers do not always know where to draw the line, said Kim Ogg,
the former head of the mayor's Anti-Gang Office.

"Zero tolerance ... necessarily focused them on minority members of
the community who looked a certain way, as opposed to acting in a
criminal fashion," Ogg testified in a sealed deposition obtained by
the Chronicle. "It concerned me that they were ... including racial
profiling in targeting members of the community for gang-level
suppression, instead of focusing on people for their known past
criminal activity."

Oregon's family filed a civil rights lawsuit alleging the city of
Houston maintained policies and practices that allowed abuses of civil
rights to occur as a matter of course.

U.S. District Judge Sim Lake agreed the family produced evidence of
unconstitutional conduct on the part of police in numerous warrantless
entries and searches. He also agreed that Oregon's attorney, Richard
Mithoff, had raised a legitimate issue about whether the warrantless
entries and searches were so widespread as to constitute a municipal
policy.

He nevertheless ruled last month that the city could not be held
liable for Oregon's death. The family is pursuing its lawsuit against
the officers involved.

Citing one instance in which police entered a home because officers
smelled burning marijuana, Lake said the commission of a misdemeanor
offense does not provide sufficient reason to justify the warrantless
entry and search of a private residence.

Ogg said gang task-force officers receive no specialized training
about how to perform their jobs within legal limits. And conflicting
policies about drug enforcement make it difficult for officers to know
when, and if, they should intervene.

Ogg, who is now the executive director of Crime Stoppers, said the
Houston Police Department's written policy prohibited gang task-force
officers from working narcotics cases without the go-ahead from a
narcotics supervisor, while the oral zero-tolerance dictum mandated
intervention in all street crime.

In practice, officers in all tactical units are assigned narcotics
cases on a regular basis. HPD Lt. Ron Walker, former supervisor of the
gang task force and other tactical units at the Northeast Patrol
Division, put his concerns in an internal memo to Police Chief C.O.
Bradford.

"Despite the department standard operating procedure and the letters
prohibiting tactical units from working narcotics cases and
complaints, we consistently get these complaints from your office,
command offices, and through citizen phone calls and community
meetings," Walker wrote. "In my case, practically every citizen
complaint and assignment sent to me and my units are directly
drug-related."

Ogg said the ineffective and conflicting HPD policies pose a danger to
the community and to officers.

"The risk is danger to the community," Ogg testified in a deposition
in the Oregon case.

The zero-tolerance policy causes minorities to be targeted unfairly
and unnecessarily. And the tactic doesn't stop serious crime in
high-crime areas, because officers do not focus on people based on
prior criminal behavior or known gang activity, she said.

Ogg also said police officers are deliberately put into a
damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't position.

"They would be placed in an untenable position between either an
unwritten policy of 'Go out and stop gang activity. We're holding you
accountable for it,' and conflicting written policies" that prohibit
gang task-force officers from working on drug cases, she said.

As much as 50 percent of the criminal activity involving gangs is
drug-related, she estimated.

Minorities and young people are most at risk for being harassed or
arrested for minor offenses -- littering, riding a bicycle on the
wrong side of the street or driving with a cracked taillight -- as
police aim to suppress criminal activity by cracking down on minor
infractions, Ogg said.

They are also most at risk for tragedy.

"Having somebody, a citizen, hurt is a possibility that existed, or
that exists, when there is a lack of clear directive," Ogg testified
during depositions in the wrongful-death lawsuit brought in behalf of
Oregon.

The Oregon shooting, which began with a zero-tolerance traffic stop
and progressed to a drug investigation, is a case in point.

On the evening of July 11, 1998, gang task-force officers Pete A.
Herrada and James R. Willis stopped a car with an 18-year-old driver,
an underage drinker and 28-year-old passenger Ryan F. Baxter.

The driver was ticketed for a Class C misdemeanor. Baxter admitted he
provided alcohol to the minor and had smoked crack cocaine earlier in
the evening. He was arrested but cut a deal for his release,
identifying Oregon's brother as his crack supplier.

Hours later, Baxter took six gang task-force officers -- Herrada,
Willis, David R. Barrera, Lamont E. Tillery, David Perkins and Sgt.
Darrell H. Strouse -- to the apartment the Oregon brothers shared.

Willis testified in state court the officers didn't have enough
evidence for a search warrant, so they enlisted Baxter's help. They
told the informant to knock on the door, then back off so the officers
could ask Rogelio Oregon, who had arrived home shortly before, for
consent to search the apartment.

But when Baxter backed away after knocking, Rogelio Oregon bolted into
the dark apartment. Thinking he was going to get a gun or destroy
evidence, Willis said he and his partner went into the apartment.

While Willis and his partner were in the front of the apartment, the
other officers went to the back and confronted Pedro Oregon. Making
their way through the dark apartment, one officer accidentally fired
his weapon and hit another officer. Thinking Pedro Oregon had fired,
the other officers -- but not Willis -- opened fire, hitting Pedro
Oregon 12 times, nine in the back.

After a lengthy investigation, Harris County grand jurors indicted
only Willis, on a misdemeanor criminal-trespass charge. He was acquitted.

Under public pressure, the U.S. Attorney's office charged Strouse and
Willis with violations of civil rights in Oregon's death. But U.S.
District Judge Nancy Atlas quashed the indictment, finding it was
based on the perjured testimony of Rogelio Oregon.

In her deposition, Ogg said such tragedies are unnecessary -- and
foreseeable.

During the 4 1/2 years she headed the Anti-Gang Office, Ogg said, she
was bombarded with complaints from the community about harassment and
beleaguered by the concerns of officers.

Strouse, the supervisor in the Oregon case, was among those who went
to Ogg with concerns about the conflicting mandates given gang officers.

"Strouse in Southwest and Walker in Northeast, a lieutenant, those
people I recall having conversations with about the potential conflict
and the conflicts that arose when they stopped gang members or when
they were investigating gang members or complaints about gang/drug
activity, about what they could and could not do," she testified.

Ogg said some officers were even asked to sign letters acknowledging
they were not to work drug cases -- but were assigned them anyway.

In 1997, Ogg said, she met with some Houston City Council members,
Bradford and some members of the HPD Command Staff to warn them of the
dangers to the community and officers. Ogg recommended scrapping the
zero-tolerance dictum and developing a written strategy for the gang
task force.

Her concerns were ignored. "They took no action over a long period of
time, other than to hold meetings to discuss it, to request written
proposals," Ogg said.

Over time, she said, she realized Bradford's unresponsiveness was not
an oversight.

"At some point, no action is a decision, an intentional decision," she
testified.

But Lake, the U.S. district judge, did not agree. Although Lake agreed
there was evidence of police misconduct in numerous warrantless
entries by gang task-force officers, Lake found the city was not
liable in Oregon's death be cause there was no proof that policy
makers in the department were aware of the routine violations.

Ogg, a former Harris County assistant district attorney, said she now
believes the conflict between the departments' written policy and the
marching orders given officers was a calculated legal strategy
designed to protect the city and the department.

"The effect of the unwritten orders and their conflict with the
written policy ... was to leave the line officers in a position of
liability and give the police department's administration a shield
from responsibility," Ogg said in an interview late last month.

Despite Lake's ruling, the Oregon family is not giving up. Mithoff,
the family's attorney, said he will file an appeal.