CLOSING ARGUMENTS BEGIN IN BLAND PRISON DRUG CASE

Summations Take 5 Hours, Still Not Over

Prosecutors Called The Defendant's Explanation That He Was Conducting
A Private Sting Operation To Catch Crooked Guards A "Fantastic,
Secret-agent Spy Story."
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Haggling over jury instructions and 5 hours of closing arguments left
no time Wednesday for a jury to begin deliberating the fate of five
people accused of running a marijuana ring inside a state prison.

Whether the jury in U.S. District Court will get that chance today
remains to be seen: attorneys for three of the defendants must still
deliver their final statements and then federal prosecutors will have
a last opportunity for rebuttal.

The prosecution began Wednesday's lengthy debate by attacking inmate
Michael Fulcher's claim that he was dealing drugs inside Bland
Correctional Center from 1995 to 1997 for his own undercover
investigation to bust dirty guards. A former informant for the Drug
Enforcement Administration, Fulcher, 40, claimed he had his mother
save money orders and incriminating letters to chart who smuggled and
sold drugs in the prison -- with hopes authorities would reduce his
48-year sentence once he turned over the documents.

Calling Fulcher's defense a "fantastic, secret-agent spy story," Lance
Salyers, a law student interning at the U.S. Attorney's Office, argued
Fulcher's real motive for saving the papers was to blackmail guards if
he ever got caught in his lucrative drug trade.

That way, Salyers explained, Fulcher "could run his business as long
as he wanted."

His mother and co-defendant, Ethel Fulcher of Roanoke, aided in the
trafficking by placing marijuana in a boom box, which a counselor
who'd fallen in love with Fulcher brought into the prison, Salyers
said. And, Salyers said, the drug proceeds ultimately went to Ethel
Fulcher, and Fulcher's wife, Rosanna Sue Nichols, also a defendant,
who then bought more marijuana .

The other two accused -- inmate Alvin G. Garcia and ex-guard William
C. King of Wytheville -- were both seen by inmates helping Fulcher
sell drugs in the prison, Salyers said.

Defense attorneys David Whaley and David Baugh took aim at the
Department of Corrections as the real criminal. Its guards and
administrators allowed marijuana to flow freely in the prison and then
tried to protect their own when Fulcher's work became public, Baugh
argued.

Baugh said both a Richmond attorney and a DEA agent knew about
Fulcher's operation long before a DOC agent began his inquiry. Michael
and Ethel Fulcher never turned over the documents because they didn't
trust what the DOC would do, Baugh said, noting that one guard caught
selling drugs is still an officer at the prison.

"What you have here are two vigilantes," Baugh said, who were foolish
enough to believe the government cared about corruption within the
DOC.

Attorneys for Nichols, Garcia and King will present their closing this
morning.