DRUG USERS TAKE RISKS COMING INTO CITY

Suburbanites drive into crime-infested D.C. neighborhoods every day to
score drugs. If they're lucky, they drive away. The unlucky buyers are
mugged, robbed, beaten or killed.

But still they come, looking for easy buys and cheap drugs, enticed by city
laws that are more easy on drug buyers and users than tougher suburban
codes. They burden the city's police force, contribute to the demise of
troubled neighborhoods and put themselves at grave risk. "Nothing matters
to them but the next hit," says Lt. Gary Fitzgerald who supervises the 1st
Police District's vice unit that fights drugs in many Capitol Hill
neighborhoods and others in Northeast.

Michael Peterson, 29, a Vienna, Va., resident injects heroin as he sits in
a Southeast alley in the Arthur Capper public housing community. "It's all
about the addiction and how strong it is," says the blond-haired blue-eyed
auto mechanic who rode Metro to the city to buy heroin one recent warm
Sunday.

"This is where the drugs are. It's where [drugs] are easiest to get," Mr.
Peterson said.

"It's the only available place I know," said a 23-year-old Fairfax County,
Va., resident who drove his Volkswagen into a Southwest neighborhood called
Greenleaf to buy a $20 bag of marijuana.

Marijuana dealers stand on street curbs for drive-through service. The
business is so competitive that two dueling dealers this particular Sunday
run up to an unmarked police truck in hopes of selling a bag to
Investigator Mike Jewell, 30, of the vice unit.

The seller soon realizes he has approached a police officer and darts off.
Cocaine and heroin dealers are more discreet. Their customers, clutching
small wads of cash, jump out of cars parked along the street and scramble
into apartment hallways to quickly swap money for drugs. Undercover vice
police Investigators Sherrie Forester, 38, and Robert Clark, 33, confiscate
the drugs from the Fairfax man in the Volkswagen. "Get back in your car and
return to Virginia," Investigator Forester says to the man, sending him on
his way at dusk. Most young suburban drug users don't realize the danger of
trekking into unfamiliar neighborhoods to buy drugs, police say.

Older drug users are addicts who know the risks, but need the fix. Police
say the suburban drug shoppers exact a toll on the city as police stop
droves of buyers, lecture them about the dangers and then usually send them
home.

"It's a drain on our resources to have to deal with not only the people
involved in the drug trade in D.C., but with the added problems of people
coming in from the suburbs to buy narcotics," said Commander William P.
McManus, who heads the 1st District.

The drug business ruins neighborhoods and keeps some residents prisoners in
their homes. On the corners, drug dealers swarm, selling their wares to the
middle class, who ride into the inner city from their safe communities far
from the violence fueled by drugs.

"There are decent people who live in these neighborhoods and are tired of
it. I've had people at their windows saying, 'Please, please, help me.'
It's like they're under siege," Investigator Forester says. "It's a city
under siege."

D.C. prosecutors require a minimum seizure of eight or nine $20 zip bags --
each about one-sixth of a gram -- to bring a felony charge, police say.

To charge suspects with a felony, prosecutors must be able to prove that a
defendant possessed the drugs to distribute or with the intent to
distribute, said Channing Phillips, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's
Office in D.C.

"You have to have evidence that it's not [just] for personal use. It's
easier to convince a judge or jury when you have eight or nine bags.
Otherwise they will knock it down to a simple possession," Mr. Phillips
said.

Detained suburbanites might, at most, see a temporary holding cell, where
they are held for a brief court appearance in D.C. Superior Court. Once
they pay an attorney and court fees, their arrest might end up costing
$1,000.

Despite complaints by police officers that prosecutors do not pursue some
drug cases, prosecutors say they are aggressive against drug sellers and
buyers in the District. But they can work only with laws on the books.

"Under the D.C. code, selling marijuana is a misdemeanor no matter how much
you sell. Only in federal court can you charge it as a felony," Mr.
Phillips said. "The risk level is much lower in terms of sentences" for
selling marijuana than for heroin or cocaine. "But it also has made
[marijuana sales] more competitive and has been associated with a lot of
violent crimes because it's territorial."

Law enforcement officers believe about 20 people were murdered as a direct
result of the drug trade in the Greenleaf area of Southwest and about 20
others died indirectly related to drug trafficking in the neighborhood,
where mostly marijuana is sold.

News of the violent crimes in that neighborhood apparently did not spread
into suburban homes. One recent Friday afternoon in Greenleaf, a man on a
bicycle cruised Delaware Avenue watching for police. He was on the
drug-dealers' payroll, police said.

It was a big day for drug sales -- payday for many workers and the
beginning of the weekend. Cars, many sporting Virginia tags, moved slowly
along the street.

Knowing two police officers are watching, the dealers instruct buyers to
drive into a parking lot shielded by buildings. "This is an open-air drug
market all day long," Investigator Clark said.

A few blocks away on I Street SE, a woman got out of a van and hurried
across the street until she was intercepted by vice officers. "Tell me the
truth.

What are you doing here?" Officer Clark asked. "Looking for my sister," the
woman replied. "They will tell you every lie in the book," Investigator
Forester.

The woman eventually admitted she was in search of heroin. "You need to go
back to Virginia," Investigator Forester told her. "And be careful. You're
in a dangerous neighborhood."

Moments later at Potomac Garden public housing complex, a 39-year-old woman
from Arlington, Va., sat behind the wheel of a rusty car with her
15-year-old son in the back seat, her swollen hands an indication of heroin
use.

"This is really sad. What kind of life are you showing him?" Investigator
Forester asked her, looking at the teen-ager. "I should lock you up for
bringing a 15-year-old boy down here to buy drugs. I wish there was a
charge like that."

Checked-by: Joel W. Johnson