NEIGHBORS LIVE IN TERROR AS DRUG HOUSES FLOURISH

Raids Prove Futile As Dealers Slip Back Into Detroit Communities

DETROIT -- Drug dealers have virtual control of houses in neighborhoods
scattered across Detroit, where crime rules, innocent residents are
terrified and police are powerless.

Nearly 300 properties in Detroit have been the scene of three or more
felony narcotics arrests since 1996. But drugs continue to be sold in and
around many of the houses -- at one, even after police made 13 drug busts.

A Detroit News review of thousands of felony narcotics complaints from 1996
to 1998 makes it clear that Detroit officials have taken few steps to
address the problem beyond repeated drug raids and have often stumbled when
they've tried.

The News' investigation further shows that the city has no unified strategy
for closing drug nuisance properties.

Residents like 75-year-old John Westbrook pay the price.

"The dope man has ruined this neighborhood," Westbrook said of the west
side area that has been his home for 50 years. One neighborhood house has
been raided at least five times. An abandoned eyesore a block away has been
raided at least a half-dozen times and remains a haven for drug users and
sellers.

"When I moved here 50 years ago, there wasn't a prettier street in the
city. Sometimes, I get so damn mad I can't see straight," Westbrook said.

Detroit Police Chief Benny Napoleon began this year by making narcotics
enforcement his department's top priority. This year, police took drugs
valued at more than $95 million off the streets -- nearly topping the total
of the two previous years combined.

But the News' investigation -- which included analyzing thousands of crime
records, more than 100 interviews and a review of land, tax, court and
police documents -- shows that repeated crackdowns on nearly 300 drug
properties often have been futile in a city where landlords are rarely held
accountable, abandoned houses fester for years and jail is rarely a reality
for dealers.

"There needs to be a meeting of the minds," Detroit Councilwoman Brenda
Scott said. "Viable strong communities are hurt by just one drug house, let
alone a bunch of them."

More than 1,800 properties in Detroit have been the scene of at least one
felony drug arrest since 1996. Of the 218 highest-traffic drug houses --
homes with three or more arrests -- only about two dozen have been
demolished. The city controls roughly 20 percent of the remaining houses,
many of which are abandoned. Most of the others are rentals.

Some 70 commercial properties were also the scene of three or more felony
drug arrests.

The News identified several key areas where strategies in place to shut
drug houses do not work.

For one, the Detroit Police Department did not use civil forfeiture
proceedings to seize a single drug house last year or in 1997. In one
earlier case where police did seize a house, the Detroit Planning and
Development Department failed to do its job: secure and sell the property.

Although the police and Wayne County prosecutor's office say the mere
threat of forfeiture is the carrot they use to persuade absentee landlords
to evict tenants, interviews with owners of more than two dozen drug
properties indicate the threat was rarely made, let alone carried out.

In addition, the police don't regularly communicate with the city Buildings
and Safety Engineering Department, which is responsible for the demolition
of more than 4,000 vacant houses and the Planning and Development
Department, which controls more than 50,000 properties.

The result: City officials don't know about drug properties that should be
demolished. In one case, a housing inspector mistook an abandoned house
being used by drug-dealing squatters for a legitimately occupied house --
and removed it from the demolition list.

And police often have arrested suspected drug dealers at a house -- only to
return days or weeks later and lock up the same dealer again.

The impact is devastating for a city that still endures some of the highest
rates of violent crime among the nation's largest cities -- even as it
shows signs of turning the corner after decades of decline.

Nearly seven in 10 Detroit neighborhoods has a house that has been raided
at least once by police narcotics squads over the past four years. The
serious crime rate in those neighborhoods is, on average, 90 crimes per
1,000 residents compared to 75 crimes per 1,000 residents in the
neighborhoods that have not had a problem with drug nuisance properties, a
News analysis shows.

The result is that many Detroiters whose neighborhoods have been turned
into drug bazaars live every day in fear.

"Everyone around here is afraid of the dope dealers," said Irene Baker, 77,
whose Brightmoor neighborhood has the highest number of drug nuisance
properties in the city. "These dopers are ruthless. They have no respect
for anybody."

Police Target Dealers

Deputy Police Chief Nathaniel Topp, who took charge of the department's
narcotics efforts this year, agrees that "crack houses are eroding
neighborhoods." But he said the department's current emphasis is on
targeting drug dealers, not specific houses.

"We want the little old lady to be able to walk to the store without having
to pass a bunch of guys selling rocks," Topp said. "We're trying to get a
handle on it."

Police have refused to release 1999 figures in a fashion that would allow
for address-by-address analysis.

But a closer look at the properties that have been plagued by drug-dealing
in years past makes it clear that once a property is used to sell drugs, it
often continues to be used to sell drugs.

More than half of the properties where police made at least one felony drug
arrest last year were the scene of at least one arrest in 1997.

Life is never easy for the people who live near drug houses.

"When those people come to your neighborhood, it's not yours anymore," said
Mary Ward, 65, a retired assembly line worker from Ford who lives near a
house on Faust that was used by drug dealers and prostitutes for more than
two years.

"They walk around like the world is theirs alone and no one is allowed to
participate."

Police made six felony narcotics arrests at the house over two years,
records show.

"The drug dealers and the prostitutes used to change shifts like I did when
I was working at Ford," Ward said. "I'd never seen anything like it in my
life."

Ward repeatedly called City Council members and the police department's
anonymous drug tip line.

"Do you know how many times a day I have to listen to that address?" an
exasperated tip line operator asked her once.

The police did show up. They raided. And they made busts.

But the dealing continued.

Earlier this year, it stopped. City records show that the property changed
hands. A new owner bought the house and moved in. The old property owner --
who was on the property during at least two of the drug raids -- moved out.
Problem solved.

But Ward is still angry about four years of deadbolting her door, of
watching her car, of dropping to her floor every time a car backfired.

"We all went through hell until that house closed," she said.

Few Properties Seized

The Detroit Police Department's forfeiture section works with the Wayne
County prosecutor's office to seize properties where drugs are sold regularly.

Under the law, police can begin forfeiture proceedings against a property
if they can prove that narcotics were sold regularly at the house. For
houses valued at less than $50,000, the police need only give the owner
notice that they intend to seize the property. If the owner does not
respond within 20 days and post a bond to cover court costs, the house is
turned over to the city's Planning and Development Department, which is
supposed to sell the house. Proceeds from the sale are to go to the police
to pay for more narcotics enforcement.

For houses worth more than $50,000 and in cases where the owners of less
expensive houses have posted a bond and plan to challenge the seizure, the
Wayne County prosecutor's office forfeiture section sues in Wayne Circuit
Court to claim the property.

But it rarely happens.

No properties were seized last year or in 1997. So far this year,
proceedings have been initiated to seize three houses.

"It's just not done enough," said Wayne County Assistant Prosecutor Nancy
Alberts, who oversees forfeiture efforts.

Communication breakdowns between police and prosecutors have led to some
missed opportunities for property seizures, she said.

Lt. Claudia Barden, who runs the department's forfeiture section, said that
record-keeping is hampered by a cumbersome filing system composed entirely
of index cards. She expects improvements in tracking drug properties and
forfeiture proceedings with the help of a new $470,000 computer system,
which has been approved, but not installed.

About 40 percent of the city's high-traffic drug properties are rentals.
The properties are difficult to seize because Alberts' office must prove
that the owners knew about drug activity but did nothing to stop it, she said.

"What we do is try to hunt the owner down and tell them what happened and
tell them that if it gets raided again, they won't be considered an
innocent party," Alberts said.

But owners don't always get hunted down. The News contacted more than two
dozen owners of houses that were the scene of three or more felony
narcotics arrests between 1996 and 1998. Only three said they had received
letters warning them that a drug arrest had been made.

There have been other problems.

Take the forfeiture case involving the house at 19203 Albany. Wayne County
Register of Deeds records show that the prosecutor's office initiated
forfeiture proceedings in 1991.

Floyd Jones, a convicted drug dealer killed shortly after forfeiture
proceedings began, had owned the house.

But the City Planning and Development Department never took possession of
the property after the forfeiture, police and prosecutors say.

Instead, the dead man's mother turned the house into a rental property.
Gloria Jones got a city permit to rent the house and the city continued to
send tax bills, which she paid.

Jones didn't realize the house had been seized until this year when she
tried to sell it and discovered a lien, said Rudy McPhaul, the real estate
agent representing her.

She sold the house for $21,350 in June, records show. McPhaul said Jones
turned the sale proceeds over to the city in exchange for a refund on the
$2,100 she'd paid in taxes.

But McPhaul said the city gave Jones no credit for the years she paid for
improvements on a house that belonged to the city.

"The city gave the woman a permit to rent the property -- after they'd
seized it. They continued to send her tax bills even after they'd seized
it," McPhaul said. "They screwed up and they screwed us up."

Communication Lacking

Abandoned houses are at the forefront of the city's war on drugs. More than
two dozen of the houses where police have made three or more felony drug
arrests between 1996 and 1998 are abandoned.

But the people who bust dealers in the vacant houses and the people
responsible for tearing down abandoned houses don't always communicate.

Geni Giannotti, director of the city's Buildings and Safety Engineering
Department, said that she gets no information from police that would help
her decide which of the city's estimated 4,300 vacant structures should get
demolition priority.

"If it's an attraction to criminals we would want to know about it,"
Giannotti said.

The house at 15733 Wildemere -- with rotted porch, plywood-covered door and
open window -- has been a powerful lure to criminals, police records show.

Police made three drug arrests at the house several days apart last
December as well as at least one in 1997 and one in 1996.

The people who live around the house say that it's been vacant for at least
five years. Neighbors' complaints led to the house being placed on the city
demolition list in 1995. But the house was removed from the list last May,
records show. A city inspector apparently determined that the house was
legally occupied.

"I don't know what happened there. We'll send someone back out," Giannotti
said.

John Westbrook, the retiree who lives near the house, says he'll probably
throw a party if the house is ever torn down.

"I don't know what it will take for them to bring it down. I hope it
doesn't take somebody getting killed there," Westbrook said.

Police Are Frustrated

No one appears to have ever been killed at 15733 Wildemere. But one man
arrested at the property posed a clear threat to two police officers,
police records show. John David Preston, 53, was armed with a loaded M-1
carbine assault rifle and was in possession of heroin when he was arrested
in the vacant house last Christmas Eve.

Preston had been arrested in the same house 10 days earlier and charged
with possession of less than 50 grams of crack cocaine. He was freed from
the Wayne County Jail within three days of the first arrest due to apparent
overcrowding there, police prisoner processing records show.

And he walked free again after his second arrest in exchange for a $250
bond. Preston -- who was also arrested on felony drug charges in 1996 and
1997 -- was sentenced in April to life on probation after pleading guilty
to charges stemming from the incident with the assault rifle, court records
show.

The fact that Preston had the ability to be free to sell more drugs almost
immediately after being arrested for serious felonies is the rule, not the
exception in Wayne County's court system, police say. And they are clearly
frustrated.

"We can only arrest people," said Cmdr. Harold N. Cureton of the narcotics
support division. "We can lock people up, which we do time and time again.
But we can't stop them."

Cops like Cureton are discouraged and residents like Baker, the Brightmoor
woman surrounded by drug houses, are frightened.

Baker said that she's planning to move to Canton Township from the
neighborhood where she has lived since Franklin Roosevelt was president.

She said her fear of drug dealers overrides any optimism she might feel
about efforts to rebuild as many as 200 houses in her neighborhood.

"I've had enough," she said.

[sidebar]

The Business Of Drugs

EX-DEALER SHOCKED BY DRUG VIOLENCE

Explosion of crack led to his decision: Get killed or go legit.

By George Hunterx / The Detroit News

DETROIT -- Crack cocaine caused Terry Kirk to go straight.

Before crack became omnipresent in the late 1980s, Kirk made his living on
the streets of the Cass Corridor by dealing cards in illegal poker games,
working as a doorman at a blind pig and hustling pool.

"Back then, there were all kinds of ways you could hustle money," said
Kirk, 36. "Then crack came along and all the other hustles dried up. If you
wanted to make any money on the street, you had to sell rocks."

Kirk said he "went with the flow" and started selling drugs -- but he
quickly found out that dealing crack was far more dangerous than dealing
five-card stud.

"You used to be able to make a living on the streets without ever touching
a gun," said Kirk, who now works at a trucking company. "Back then, you
could get over by using your wits. But in the dope game, your wits don't
mean a thing if you don't have an Uzi to back you up."

Although he had no problem working outside of the law, Kirk said the
rampant violence of the drug trade forced him to abandon his life of crime
and find a steady job.

"I figured I had two choices: I could either wind up getting killed or go
legit."

Crack brought in a new, more violent breed of criminal, Kirk said. "These
people don't care if they live or die," he said. "The dope dealers sure
aren't worried about the police; they laugh about the police. If they do
get arrested, they know they'll be back on the street in a couple of days."

Kirk said he saw drug-related violence everywhere while he was selling crack.

"I remember one time, I was going to a dope house to re-up (buy more drugs
to sell)," he said. "Someone had been shot there earlier that day, and
there was blood all over the stairs. You could still see pieces of the
guy's brains or something splattered on the wall. I'd see that kind of
stuff all the time."

[sidebar]

Failures

13 RAIDS CAN'T STOP FLOW OF DRUGS

House on French is target of police busts most often.

By Wayne Woolley / The Detroit News

DETROIT -- The small brown house with the green shutters isn't exactly the
showpiece of the 3800 block of French.

It's been raided for drugs at least 13 times since 1996 -- tops for any one
house in Detroit.

Paperwork filed after police raids at the house showed cases where heroin
was sold to undercover officers and other cases where dealers tried to
flush cocaine down toilets.

Although police and neighbors said that illegal drug sales at the property
have drastically slowed from two years ago, when police made 10 felony drug
busts there, it still goes on.

Interviews, police reports, city land and tax records indicate that members
of the Richardson family have occupied the house since 1970.

The family patriarch, Willie Richardson, 85, also lives at the house, but
police say he is not involved in narcotics sales.

One other family member, Anthony Richardson, 38, has a long record of drug
arrests. He has been arrested at least five times on drug charges, police
records show.

Drug Houses In Detroit

* 69.5 percent of Detroit's neighborhoods have had at least one property
with a drug arrest in the past four years.

* Of 1,844 drug arrests from 1996-98, 37 percent of the locations had
repeated arrests.

* Neighborhoods without any drug arrests shared some characteristics. They
had higher median incomes, higher homeowner rates and residents had more
years of education.

Source - Detroit News analysis of crime data and of demographic projections
from Claritas, Inc. The demographic data are projections based on 1990
Census information.

Calling For Help

To report drug activity in your neighborhood, call the the Detroit Police
Narcotics Section's hotline at 224-DOPE. All callers will remain anonymous.

[sidebar]

Neighborhood In Trouble

DEALERS CROWD OUT LONG-TIME RESIDENTS

Unchecked sales, police corruption show 'nobody cares.'

By George Hunter / The Detroit News

In Brightmoor, the underworld thrives in broad daylight.

Throughout the west side neighborhood, dozens of drug dealers loiter
conspicuously on street corners and in front of abandoned houses, brazenly
advertising their presence by waving and shouting to passing motorists: "I
got it."

When a car does stop, the deals often go down without so much as a backward
glance to see if the police are coming.

In Brightmoor, it's the residents -- not the pushers -- who are afraid.

"People in this neighborhood are scared to come outside," said Juan
Franklin, who's lived in the area for two years. "It's ridiculous -- people
shouldn't have to live like that."

The tiny community -- eight blocks long and four blocks wide -- has one of
the highest concentrations of drug activity in the city, a Detroit News
analysis of police records show. Over the last four years, police have made
at least 70 drug arrests at 49 different houses in Brightmoor.

But residents say the numerous arrests haven't put a dent in the furious
drug activity -- or the fear.

"There's a dope house on every corner," Franklin said. "I'm not
exaggerating. The dealers all hang outside, in groups. You can't walk down
the street without running into a bunch of them."

Irene Baker, 77, plans to move out of the neighborhood after living in the
same house for 64 years. "Enough is enough," she said. "I don't want to
leave; this has been my home since I was 13 years old. But I keep waiting
for things to get better, and they never do."

Baker believes city officials have turned their backs on the residents of
Brightmoor.

"Nobody cares," she said. "(Mayor Dennis) Archer only cares about the
casinos. He really needs to get off his duff and do something about what's
going on in his city. The seniors in Brightmoor are scared to death."

Residents who confront the drug dealers often pay a heavy price, Baker said.

"The dopers beat my friend up pretty bad. An old lady! She tried to get
them to stop selling drugs in front of her house, so they beat her. These
drug people are like animals," Baker said. "What kind of person would do
that to an old lady?"

Police corruption has contributed to the general sense of hopelessness felt
by many residents. Five officers from the nearby 6th (Plymouth) Precinct
were convicted in March of stealing money and drugs from dealers in
exchange for immunity. The officers also staged crack-house raids to steal
drugs, money and guns.

The corruption -- combined with the impudent manner in which the dealers
operate -- have given many residents the impression that the police aren't
on their side. "I'm sure most of the police are doing the best they can in
a very tough situation," said Clifford Rice, pastor of the West Outer Drive
United Methodist Church. "But there are a lot of crooked cops in this
neighborhood, too. People around here are already having a tough time. When
they feel like the police are in with the drug dealers, it doesn't make it
any easier."

Amid the gloom, there are signs of progress. Construction began last year
on Brightmoor Homes, a 100-unit development of affordable houses. More than
20 homes have already been built. No completion date has been set for the
development, said Angela Donn, property supervisor for Management Systems
Inc., the Detroit firm overseeing part of the project.

Residents will have the option to purchase the homes after 15 years, Donn
said. "We think this is going to be a turning point for the neighborhood,"
Donn said. "We had over 800 responses from people who wanted to move into
the new homes."

Donn said she hopes the development will have a positive effect on the rest
of the neighborhood. "We're planning on turning 'blightmoor,' into
'Brightmoor,' she said.

Rice provides other slivers of hope to the community. During his seven
years at the church, he's set up a number of sports programs and youth
activities.

He said the children in his congregation are proud of the basketball and
baseball trophies that occupy a wooden shelf near the church entrance.
"It's important that these kids have something to feel good about," Rice
said. "They need to know that they can accomplish things. With all the
negative forces in their lives, it's vital that they get some kind of
positive reinforcement."

But, Rice admitted, he sometimes feels like he's fighting an unwinnable
battle.

"Our church has been broken into a dozen times during the past year," he
said."Sometimes it can get you down. But I'm not about to give up any time
soon."

Others have had enough.

"I'm moving out of here as soon as I can," said Angela Sims, a mother of
three. "My oldest daughter is 10, and in a few years, she'll be at that age
where kids start getting into trouble. "I want my kids to have a chance in
life," Sims said. "They shouldn't have to grow up around all this."

Portrait Of One Drug-Ridden Neighborhood

Brightmoor has more houses with drug arrests than any other neighborhood in
Detroit. The city has razed several houses in the neighborhood.

Brightmoor History

Over the last four years, police have made at least 70 drug arrests at 49
different houses in Brightmoor. Here's how the arrests break down.

* 33 houses had at least one drug arrest, 67.3 percent of the total houses
with drug arrests in the neighborhood.

* 13 houses had at least two drug arrests, 26.5 percent of the total.

* Two houses had at least three drug arrests, 4.1 percent of the total.

* One house had at least five drug arrests, 2.0 percent of the total.

*Percentages may not total 100 percent due to rounding.

Source - Detroit News analysis of Detroit Police crime data.

How The News Tracked Drug Houses

* The Detroit News analyzed more than 150,000 crime records for 1998 in
Detroit as well as thousands of drug arrest records for 1996, 1997 and 1998.

* The News used a computer program to pinpoint each crime on a map of the
city. The paper also compared crime rates in some neighborhoods to other
features of those areas, such as home ownership and years of education
through the help of Fannie Mae statistical expert Bradley Chranko, a
mapping analyst with Housing Impact Research and Operations department of
the national mortgage provider.

* Reporters visited each of the nearly 300 properties with three or more
felony drug arrests to interview neighbors and ascertain whether the
properties are still a problem.

[sidebar]

DRUGS TAKE OVER QUIET NEIGHBORHOOD

Local Church, Pushers Reach An Uneasy Standoff

By Wayne Woolley / The Detroit News

DETROIT-- On most Sundays, there are fewer than 40 voices inside the
Northwest Church of God. But their power forces the upbeat melodies of the
gospel tune "Holy is the Name of the Lord" out of the squat brick building
at Parkside and Midland and into streets that resemble an open-air drug
market, even before noon on a Sunday.

If there's a message to the music, it seems lost on the young men who fix
visitors with menacing stares and are occasionally seen adjusting handguns
in the waistbands of baggy jeans and designer sweatpants.

"If I can see them out there pushing -- and they're out there pushing all
of the time -- why can't the police?" asked Lavada Gray, a retired social
worker in her 70s and a longtime congregation member.

An extensive review of felony narcotics reports shows that the police do
see the drug dealers, but have been unable to stop them.

The three-block area that extends north of the church has six houses that
have been raided three times or more by police since 1996 -- the highest
concentration of high-traffic drug houses in the city, a Detroit News
analysis shows.

Police raided another 16 houses in the immediate area over the same period.

It is a history that both disgusts and amazes 32-year-old Henrietta Thomas,
who grew up in the neighborhood with many of the same men who now poison it
with drugs.

"You can see (the police) raid. But as soon as they're gone, the guys are
back out," Thomas said. "You wonder, are they paying the cops? They need to
switch what they're doing because whatever it is isn't working."

Thomas, who works as a secretary, recently moved back into a church-owned
house in the neighborhood with her four children, who range in age from 2
to 9.

After growing up and living in the neighborhood for most of her life, she
moved away about two years ago when one of the dealers' customers broke
into her house looking for something to steal and pawn for a quick fix.

The church brought her back to the neighborhood and the quality of nearby
school, Thurgood Marshall, gives her reason to stay.

"I've got fairly decent neighbors," Thomas said. "But there are probably 25
guys in this neighborhood that are making it bad for everybody."

Indeed, census records show that Thomas' neighborhood has some stability
underneath the drug traffic.

Of the 343 housing units in the immediate neighborhood, slightly more than
half are owned by the people who live there. But many of the problems stem
from abandoned houses, which account for one in 10 houses in the neighborhood.

Although one house in the immediate area of the church was demolished in
November, as many as a dozen others have been abandoned for as long as a
decade.

Thomas said that the men who sell drugs give her no problem. But she knows
the life they lead could spill into hers or the lives of her children in an
instant.

She's seen the dealers exchange of cash for guns and she hears at least two
gunshots a week.

"You're scared if you're out walking because you're afraid of getting
shot," she said.

Thomas and other members of her congregation, which formed in the 1950s,
have reached an uneasy truce with the occupying army of dealers who have
strengthened over the past decade.

Elder Clayton L. Keene, the pastor, said that the church has tried hard to
reach out.

"We have, in the past, canvassed the neighborhood," Keene said. "Most of
the people are good and upstanding. There are a few who are making it look
bad."

Keene has been part of the church since the 1960s, when his father, Bishop
Connie L. Keene Jr. was the leader of the church.

He took over after his father, who oversaw more than 50 other Churches of
God, died in 1991.

The church distributes food baskets to the neighborhood's needy during
holidays and has buried free of charge a number of addicts done in by the
drug trade.

The dealers and their customers, in turn, do not harass members of the
church congregation when they arrive for Sunday services. They leave their
cars alone as well.

But tensions exist.

The congregation members came to odds with the drug people earlier this
year when they tried to evict people who had been squatting in a house the
church had purchased and hoped to rehabilitate.

The dealers fought eviction for more than three months. The day after they
moved out, the house burned down.

Earl Powell, another longtime member of the church, vacillates between
words expressing anger against the dealers and words expressing concern
that they would do something to hurt the congregation.

He also has the ability to mix words of despair with words of hope. "It's a
losing battle when you organize, report it and they appease you with a few
raids and you're right back where you started," he said. "But we're
Christians. And being a Christian means you fight for what's right."