ANATOMY OF A DRUG BUST

Austin police pulled up to the house on Sherwyn Drive just as a school bus
arrived and honked its horn.

A little girl in pigtails stepped outside the home, looked up in surprise
at the officers and hurried onto the bus.

Inside, 42-year-old Robert Turner, the man Sgt. Ernest Pedraza's team was
looking for, was sleeping on a mattress in the kitchen. Police say Turner
is one of 45 people who sold crack cocaine to undercover officers during
Operation Heatwave, a five-week investigation that ended Friday morning
with the arrests of dozens of suspected street-level drug dealers in East
Austin.

"They're usually fast asleep, just trying to get over from the night
before," Pedraza said. "There's not much fight to them."

The suspects, ages 13 to 48, were rousted out of bed in a coordinated sweep
that capped often tedious and sometimes dangerous undercover work. Fourteen
suspects remained at large. All of the adults face up to two years in jail.

The arrests were made with little incident, which wasn't always the case
during the drug buys and the occasional flares of violence that preceded
Friday's sweep.

The idea was to conduct the surveillance as quietly as possible so other
street-level drug dealers were not alerted. Operation Heatwave didn't
always work that way.

Officer David Espinoza, his gun drawn, found himself creeping up a
staircase inside a Springdale Gardens apartment two weeks ago. He was
looking for the man he had watched trade crack cocaine for $20 from an
undercover officer. Uniformed officers who arrived shortly after the sale
had sent the suspect running.

Espinoza and officer Frank Dixon, partners in the Central East Street
Response Team, shouted the man's name, but the only reply was the rustling
of miniblinds. Peeking around a corner, Espinoza watched the suspect's feet
slip out a second-story window.

The man hit the grass running, climbed a wrought-iron fence and dashed
across Springdale Road. Espinoza sprinted back to the parking lot, swatting
his partner's spit cup from the roof of their unmarked car before giving chase.

On Prock Lane, 55-year-old Silas Woodworth told the officers that a
stranger had run into his rent house, offering a wad of cash to hide him
from police. Sgt. Jeff Adickes then spotted the suspect on his belly on a
second-floor balcony.

The suspect slipped back inside, ran to an open window and jumped, landing
face-first on an old dog house that crumbled beneath him. His shirt torn
and his gold teeth bloody, the suspect, Jeff Guy, 22, was charged with
delivery of a controlled substance, evading arrest and trespassing.

That same night, officer Robert Morse was waiting for Ellis Berry, an
18-year-old drug-dealing suspect, to leave a convenience store on Loyola
Lane when things got rough. As he walked out, Berry bent down to pick up
something he dropped -- Morse said he believes it was crack -- and looked
up to see the officer standing over him.

He paused for a moment, then lowered a shoulder and tried to run through
the officer, police said. Morse grabbed on and wrestled Berry to the
concrete as three more officers jumped on the pile, hitting Berry in the
kidneys before he gave up. The officers never found the plastic bag they
thought Berry dropped.

Mostly, however, the undercover work proceeded quietly, several nights a
week, as police targeted drug dealers identified by East Austin neighbors
and other officers. The work was coordinated by the street response team --
officers who work with residents to identify and solve neighborhood
problems. Some neighborhoods complain of burglaries; others ask police to
curb prostitution. In central East Austin, they asked for aggressive drug
enforcement.

After Friday's roundup, police invited dozens of neighbors to a meeting at
the Rosewood-Zaragoza Neighborhood Center to announce the arrests and thank
them for the crime tips that made the operation successful.

"This new method of police work is going to bode good for citizens and bad
for criminals," Police Chief Stan Knee said. "I've always imagined the
street response as the cavalry coming over the hill to aid patrol."
Elizabeth Snipes, a retiree living on Kuhlman Avenue, said her neighborhood
is quieter because of the response team's work. She praised the effort and
asked for more.

"We're overdue for a cleanup," said Snipes, 69. "They should do more of
what they're doing."

District Attorney Ronnie Earle said he plans to meet with the residents in
the coming weeks to ask their opinion on how the cases should be
prosecuted. Earle's office did the same thing after last year's Operation
Rockhound, in which officers arrested 55 alleged drug dealers in the same
area. About 80 percent of those arrested served jail time, Earle said.

None of the suspects arrested in Operation Rockhound were seen selling
drugs during this year's operation, a sign that the crackdowns are having a
long-term effect, Adickes said.

"We're trying to drive the street-level dealers back into their houses and
off the street corner to provide a little relief for the community, so
their kids don't have to walk past the dealers on their way to school,"
Adickes said at 5:30 a.m. Friday as officers prepared for the early-morning
warrant sweep.

After their briefing inside a neighborhood center, officers divided into
seven teams of five and left, hoping to catch their suspects groggy and in bed.

After making two quick arrests, Pedraza's warrant team set out after a
16-year-old LBJ High School student charged with dealing crack. It turned
out police had the wrong address, but officer Dixon had an idea and pulled
out his cell phone. After getting the teen's real address and phone number
from juvenile crime authorities, Dixon dialed the boy's number.

"Hey man, this is J. You gonna be at school today?" Dixon asked.

The answer was yes, but before the student could leave, the warrant squad
rolled to his house and made the arrest.

As 8 a.m. approached, officers set out to catch their biggest prize of the
day. Police said Robert Lauderdale, 38, sold crack to undercover officers
on three different days during Operation Heatwave. The officers found the
suspect in bed at his home on Fairplay Court.

As the morning grew hot, officers Dixon and Carl Hendricks arrested Avis
Elmore, 27, inside a home on Harvey Street for allegedly selling crack on
July 25. Sweating in the front seat with her hands cuffed behind her,
Elmore admitted to using crack but said she does not sell the drug. She
said she was worried about her 19-month-old son and 9-year-old daughter,
who live with their grandmother in Round Rock.

"I have two lifestyles," said Elmore. She said she comes to East Austin to
smoke crack and "hustle" money on the streets. In Round Rock, she said,
"I'm a drug-free mother of two."

On their way to jail, Hendricks grabbed a napkin from the glove box and
wiped Elmore's brow dry.

You may contact Jason Spencer at jspencer@statesman.com or 445-3605.