DRUG INQUIRY TARGETS EX-AIDE

FBI Looks At Alleged Ties Between Traffickers, Chief's Former Assistant

The former right-hand man to police Chief Carlos Leon is being investigated
for alleged ties to drug traffickers, according to police documents.

Mayor Carlos Ramirez announced Monday that 49-year-old officer Luis
Cortinas, Leon's former administrative assistant, had been placed on
administrative leave because of allegations being investigated by the FBI.
Ramirez and other officials declined to discuss the nature of those
allegations, but police documents obtained by the El Paso Times say
investigators received information that linked Cortinas to drug traffickers.

"The particular type of intelligence could include, but was not limited to,
giving drug dealers information on undercover police vehicles, naming
undercover narcotics and Alpha officers and providing drug escort
services," according to a police synopsis of the Cortinas investigation
obtained by the Times. Alpha officers work with anti-drug task forces that
include federal law enforcement agents.

Repeated attempts to contact Cortinas, a 27-year police veteran, for
comment were unsuccessful. At his East Side home Tuesday, a woman who
identified herself as his wife told the Times that Cortinas left on a
camping trip Sunday and could not be reached.

The police began investigating Cortinas on April 7, more than seven months
after Assistant Police Chief George De Angelis told Leon he had taken
information about Cortinas to the FBI, according to police documents.

The administrative assistant position gave Cortinas access to police drug
operations and other sensitive information, De Angelis said in an
interview. For example, the administrative assistant would be privy to the
Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force reports, De Angelis said.

De Angelis said the most important complaint about Leon that he took to
city officials April 12 was Leon's seven-month delay in authorizing a
police investigation into the allegations about Cortinas.

"I had a huge problem with the fact that we had information that our
officers' lives might be in danger, but (Leon) refused to initiate an
investigation into it until seven months later," De Angelis said Monday.

Leon declined to say why he did not initiate an investigation into the
Cortinas matter sooner.

"I believe I handled (the Cortinas matter) correctly," Leon said Tuesday.
"Now, there are issues I can't comment on, investigative techniques,
investigative policies. ... It would be very inappropriate for me to
comment any further on this."

Ramirez said that there is no current police investigation into Cortinas
but that the FBI is conducting an investigation. FBI officials said they
couldn't confirm or deny such reports.

Ramirez has said he first learned of the allegations against Cortinas in
April, when De Angelis made several allegations of mismanagement and other
problems against Leon.

Monday, the mayor reprimanded Leon for backdating an official police
document, but cleared him of other allegations. He said Cortinas would be
placed on paid administrative leave while the FBI investigated allegations
against him.

Phil Jordan, a former Drug Enforcement Agency employee for more than 30
years and the director of the El Paso Intelligence Center in the mid-1990s,
said Tuesday that law enforcement along the U.S.-Mexico border should
constantly be in heightened state of alert against infiltration by drug
traffickers.

"Before I left in the mid-1990s, we were seeing an increasing number of
incidents and allegations that indicated the cancer of corruption was
spreading over to the U.S. side of the border," Jordan said.

'Not cause for alarm'

Cortinas was Leon's handpicked administrative assistant from January 1999
through Sept. 12, 1999, when Cortinas was reassigned to the Pebble Hills
Regional Command Center.

Asked whether the public should be concerned that the chief's former
administrative assistant has been accused of possibly having ties to drug
traffickers, Leon said, "It should not be cause for alarm. I've always held
this office in highest esteem, and I wouldn't jeopardize that."

He said he could not comment on specifics of the Cortinas investigation.

De Angelis outlined his concerns about Cortinas in an Aug. 31, 1999, memo
to Leon. Cortinas left the administrative assistant's job 12 days later,
but Leon declined to say whether those actions were related.

"There were many, many factors that play into Officer Cortinas' leaving,"
Leon said.

Leon said he picked Cortinas for the job because "he's very good in the
community. He's well-known in the community."

Cortinas' community involvement has included being part of the El Paso Boys
& Girls Clubs board of directors. El Paso lawyer Mitzi Shannon is
chairwoman of that board and wrote to the Police Department on April 3 to
praise Cortinas.

"Through his enthusiasm, dedication and unique insight into the special
needs of the youth of El Paso, he has already provided invaluable
assistance to the Boys & Girls Club," Shannon wrote.

Shannon could not be reached for comment.

Early objections

De Angelis said he objected when Leon appointed Cortinas, a former
undercover narcotics officer, as administrative assistant after Leon
assumed the chief's job in January 1999.

The police investigation synopsis reported numerous allegations and rumors
about Cortinas' possible ties to drug dealers going back as far as the 1970s.

None of those allegations resulted in criminal charges against Cortinas,
but the type and number of allegations should have been enough for Leon to
look for someone else for the administrative assistant position, De Angelis
said.

"I urged Carlos not to appoint Cortinas to that position because he had too
much baggage," De Angelis said. "Even if these were all unsubstantiated
rumors, why take any risk at all on someone with any baggage like that when
you have 1,000 officers to choose from for that position?"

Leon and Cortinas joined the department within a year of each other in the
1970s and worked together in the early to mid-1990s at the Pebble Hills
Regional Command Center.

Asked whether he and Cortinas were friends before he became chief, Leon
said, "I would describe him as one of many acquaintances I had in the
department."

Investigation unfolds

The Police Department's criminal investigation of Cortinas began April 7,
and six days later police investigators were told by the FBI that Cortinas'
"name had come up in other investigations that they were conducting.
Specifically cases involving known drug lords," according to the
investigation synopsis.

"Intelligence had been gathered in reference to Officer Cortinas'
involvement, but no official investigation was being conducted by the FBI"
at that time, the document said.

The document notes that situation changed by April 24, and the FBI assumed
"an active role."

FBI spokesman Al Cruz said the agency had no comment on the Cortinas matter.

The police investigation of Cortinas also uncovered reports of a "hit list"
targeting 10 El Paso law enforcement officers for assassination. The
investigation does not link Cortinas to the reputed hit list.

A high-ranking U.S. Customs Service official told detectives that as
recently as May 1, the federal agency had received information about "a
possible narcotic cartel who was training and will move to El Paso to
commit these hits." Customs officials couldn't be reached for comment.

Leon said he had not been told about an alleged hit list.

"This is the first I hear about it," Leon said in an interview Tuesday.