COUNTY AFTER CRACK MOTEL

Hindu Group Says It Knew Nothing Of Drug Dealings In Building It Owns

In one room is a religious shrine. In several others, there are black
smudges from concussion grenades lobbed in a police raid that
uncovered drugs and weapons.

Welcome to the Monterey Motel, whose owners, a religious society, are
fighting to keep their investment amid allegations they gave an
enterprising crack dealer free rein on the property.

The Pima County Attorney's Office recently initiated civil forfeiture
proceedings against the building, at 505 W. Miracle Mile.

The area surrounding the motel has long held a reputation as a center
of drug dealing and prostitution, but investigators allege that the
Monterey had cornered the market on crack cocaine.

"It was kind of like Super Kmart being next to a mom-and-pop
drugstore," said Tucson police Sgt. Lew Bentley, who started an
investigation last fall in response to neighborhood complaints.

The attorney for the Sri Ram Society, a Hindu group and part of the
International Hari Krishna Movement, said society members such as
President Krsna Namananda Das may have lived on the property but were
worlds apart from their drug-using guests.

"They're in their own world, oriented on getting high," attorney D.
Jesse Smith said. "Mr. Das was preoccupied with . . . Godly concerns,
and the police were focusing on making a bust. They may have viewed
the same things very differently."

Das and his wife maintain they were unaware of any drug dealing until
police raided the motel on Feb. 26.

"It sounded like some kind of war going on," said Das, who had been
asleep. His wife, Lailo Khalilova, agreed: "We wanted to call the
police, but it was the police."

The religious group had no experience operating a motel when it bought
the property four years ago and only intended to rent to the public
until the mortgage was paid, attorney Smith said.

"Unfortunately it's in the kind of neighborhood that attracts a
high-crime clientele," Smith said. "They just didn't have the
knowledge or training to properly operate the business - but that in
no way means they were doing anything wrong."

Deputy County Attorney Kevin Krejci has a different
view.

"It appears as far as we know that the drug dealing that was going on
was fairly open, it was fairly frequent and that the . . . officers of
the corporation were present in places where drugs were openly on display."

In addition to the property, valued at $482,013, authorities are
trying to seize $14,013.76 in cash and personal property taken in the
raid, according to a complaint filed April 26 in Pima County Superior
Court.

"If you allow someone to use your property knowing that person is
selling narcotics and that person is deriving their income from
selling narcotics and that . . . they're paying for their room with
some of the income, then you're putting your property at risk because
you're allowing it to be a site of drug trafficking and profiting
thereby," Krejci said.

Smith said he understands why police could have thought Das was
involved in the operation. Officers found white powder and $13,000 in
cash in the safe when they searched the motel office.

Criminal charges were filed against Das and another priest, then
dropped. Testing showed the powder was homeopathic medicine from
India. The cash was from a T-shirt concession at the Sabino Canyon
Visitor's Center.

Das said police questioned him extensively about a motel guest's
husband, Jimmy Renke - "if I am taking money from Jimmy, keeping it at
the office and drug dealing. I said no," Das recalled.

Authorities allege Renke was at the center of the drug
operation.

"He came out here and got involved in the narcotics business, made
some contacts, got himself set up in the hotel and wanted to take over
as much of the crack cocaine business as he could," said Sgt. Bentley,
who led the Police Department's West Side community response team.

"He was a guy who used intimidation, force and crack cocaine to get
(people) to do whatever he wanted them to do," Bentley said.

Renke, who faces trial July 5 on drug and weapons charges, used video
surveillance and sentries who actively patrolled the property to
protect himself from police, Bentley said.

"They felt they were pretty well-secured inside that hotel," Bentley
said.

Das said he never questioned the installation of a video security
camera outside Room 17. "In America it's not a big thing for someone
to have a camera," he said.

Das said he and his wife were in India when Renke arrived on the
scene, and returned only 23 days before the raid. "He was only
visiting here," Das said." His wife was renting the room, and he used
to come and visit. . . . He's just a nice guy; that's all I know."

Attorney Smith faulted police for allowing the drug sales to continue
after first learning about them.

"If they knew people were selling drugs, they should have gone ahead
and arrested them instead of letting them go on," Smith said. "It's
not the fault of the temple."

Bentley said police talked "numerous, countless times" about problems
but got no cooperation from the society's vice president, who ran the
motel in Das' absence and has returned to India. Bentley said a bust
was delayed because it took time to build a case with the
extraordinary security system Renke had installed.

Quick busts also have drawbacks, prosecutor Krejci
said.

"Instead of taking one dealer off the street, you may miss the
opportunity to take a whole organization out of business."

Police took extra precautions during the raid because they considered
Renke extremely dangerous. Officers found Renke in Room 17 with a
revolver under his pillow and a shotgun and a crossbow nearby.

A Pima County grand jury indicted Renke March 7 on three drug charges,
five weapons charges and one count of fortification of a building used
for the sale or manufacture of dangerous or narcotic drugs. Neither
Renke nor his attorney could be reached for comment.

Debbie Greene, another guest, was indicted on four drug possession
charges and two weapons charges.

Court records show no one contests that narcotics were found in
several of the rooms, but defense attorneys maintain their clients
were not involved.

Tucson City Councilman Jerry Anderson said the area has long had
problems with "landlords who are not responsible enough to screen who
they rent to - they let just anyone in there who has cash to pay rent."

The Monterey Motel itself has been a problem for a while, Anderson
said. "They've been suspected of allowing their tenants to conduct
illegal activities and been aware of it. The management has been aware
of it - both prostitution and drug dealing," he said.

"It looks like we have the goods on them to shut them
down."

The action is just one step in a larger renaissance Anderson envisions
for the area.

"It's going to take time, and it's going to take some investment from
the city. For so long it's had a tradition of if you want to score
drugs or look for a prostitute that Miracle Mile was the place to go."

Meanwhile, the raid has left the Sri Ram Society with no money to
build the temple it envisioned. Members also overpaid for the property
when they moved from Hawaii, attorney Smith said, and revenues are
disappointing.

The only time the motel's 16 rooms are full is during the annual
Tucson Gem and Mineral Showcase. Only five or six of the 16 rooms are
occupied the rest of the year, Das said. "Sometimes all week nobody
comes."

Weekly rates average $150 to $175, while a single night is $30. All of
the guests who lived there at the time of the raid are gone, and Das
has repaired most of the damage he said police caused by bursting into
rooms.

And none of the people who were arrested is ever welcome to come back,
said Das, who has photographs that show him in a life of religious
study.

His work with the society has taken him to Hawaii, India, Bangladesh
and Japan. He said he and his wife follow strict principles that
forbid intoxication, gambling, sex except for procreation and eating
animal products.

The society hopes that Pima County will drop its forfeiture action
once all the facts come out in the case.

"The truth is that, ourselves," Das said, "we never saw drugs or how
they look like."