LACK OF ACCOUNTABILITY TAINTS POLICE UNDERCOVER UNIT

THE SLUSH FUND the Memphis Police Department's Organized Crime Unit
built with confiscated drug money and allowed to run out of control
gravely threatens public confidence in the department's integrity.

Police and city officials have moved usefully, if belatedly, to rein
in the many excesses arising from the use of forfeiture money. But
removing the suspicion of corruption that unjustly taints the
department's overwhelming majority of honest officers and supervisors
will require more aggressive action - both administrative reforms and
criminal indictments and convictions if warranted.

A state audit released Thursday, largely in response to reporting by
The Commercial Appeal, documents in startling detail the utter lack of
accountability with which Organized Crime Unit officials spent seized
drug funds. That money was to be used to enhance drug enforcement,
through such investigative tools as payments to informants and
undercover operations, but often was diverted to other purposes - some
of them illegal - according to the audit.

The report offers the blunt but evidently justified conclusion that
"the illegal policies and procedures developed by the city and the
lack of review by auditors independent of the (police) department
resulted in a blatant lack of internal controls over undercover cash
operations. . . ."

How blatant? The audit, which examined OCU uses of drug forfeiture
funds from mid-1994 through March of this year, cites 34 findings of
improper conduct and a dozen "highlights" of particular outrages. Each
is more disheartening than the last.

In just one year, more than $100,000 ostensibly earmarked for
confidential police operations was spent on other things, including
lawn care, golf fees, phone bills and meals. Officers collected more
than $43,500 to "pay" drug informants who apparently didn't exist.

Undercover cash and credit cards helped furnish the office of former
police director Walter Winfrey and upgrade sound systems on OCU
vehicles. Police officials charged to the department more than $1,500
in air travel costs for spouses and family members. Two officers
pocketed a $900 refund they collected when their hotel accommodations,
paid for by the city, were unsatisfactory.

More than $90,000 spent from confidential funds, and more than $65,000
of police travel expenses related to drug fund operations, were
documented inadequately or not at all. Another $17,500 in travel
spending was improper. Other large sums of cash floated around loosely.

The audit charges that Memphis police officials developed their own
procedures for managing undercover cash that often were at odds with
state guidelines, but attributed them improperly to the state
Comptroller's Office. It observes that independent auditors never have
reviewed OCU records, and that city auditors did not examine them
before last spring. The OCU routinely ignored city purchasing rules by
invoking its confidential status, according to the audit.

Interim Police Director Bill Oldham, who assumed the department's top
spot just weeks before the audit period ended, already has tightened
controls in response to the audit findings. For example, the audit
notes that the Police Department now follows state rules on the use of
seized drug money.

Mayor Willie Herenton says his administration "will not tolerate the
activities revealed by the audit." But the question remains: Why was
the OCU permitted to operate for so long as a law unto itself in
administering drug money?

Criminal probes by the FBI and Tennessee Bureau of Investigation may
provide some answers. It is in the Police Department's own interest to
cooperate with those investigations.

The fact that the money at issue was the product of criminal activity
rather than taxpayer contributions does not mitigate the offenses
described in the audit. Oldham's prediction that the findings will
"discredit the reputation" of the OCU and his department seems sadly
accurate.

What matters now is what the Police Department and city administration
do to determine how such a fiasco occurred - and to ensure that it
never happens again.