COURT FILE MISSING IN EX-DETECTIVE'S CASE

Polk County District Court officials have lost the court file of a
former West Des Moines police detective who was charged with stealing
$705 and a firearm while on duty.

Edwin Gordon was arraigned Friday morning, but there was some
confusion at the beginning of the hearing because his attorney could
not find his file.

A spokeswoman for the office of District Court Clerk Jerry Weiss
denied that the file was lost; she said it had been misplaced.

"I wouldn't say it was lost (because) it is in the hands of someone,"
said Cindy Marshall, a supervisor in the clerk's office. "We just
can't find it."

Marshall said it is rare for the office to lose a file, but Assistant
County Attorney Steve Foritano, who is prosecuting the Gordon case,
disagreed.

"We wish," Foritano said. "It happens a couple of times a
month."

Foritano said that clerks have sometimes taken files to the wrong
courtroom and that it takes a while for the paperwork, which details
the charges, to make its way back into the filing system.

He said there was little chance that Gordon's file had been misplaced
in an effort to help him get the charges dropped. Gordon's lawyer,
Maggi Moss, agreed.

"There's nothing sinister," she said. "They lose a lot of
stuff."

Gordon was charged Sept. 4 with two misdemeanor theft charges. One
accuses him of taking a $705 cashier's check, and a second accuses him
of taking a firearm. He resigned in July after the Police Department
put him on unpaid leave.

Foritano declined to release details on the two alleged thefts, but
officials from the state Division of Criminal Investigation confirmed
that the incidents happened while Gordon was on duty.

Although his paperwork had been temporarily misplaced, Gordon was
still arraigned Friday. District Judge Patricia Houlihan set a preliminary
hearing for Nov. 6 and the trial for Dec. 2.

At the end of the day Friday, Marshall said court officials had to
re-create the file with copies of the documents because they could not
find it.

Checked-by: Patrick Henry