DRUG ENFORCEMENT

DEA Investigated, Insisted Embezzlers Be Prosecuted

I would like to comment on your recent editorial, "Clean up the DEA," (July
20.)

For the record, it was hard-working, honest DEA (Drug Enforcement
Administration) employees who discovered the two criminal embezzlements
cited in your editorial. It was DEA, not auditors, who relentlessly pursued
the investigations, gathered the evidence and insisted that those
responsible for these reprehensible embezzlement schemes be prosecuted to
the fullest extent of the law.

We at DEA hold ourselves to the highest standards of public service. We will
not tolerate violations of the public trust and we do not tolerate illegal
behavior.

Even before we discovered the thefts we recognized that there have been
shortcomings in our financial-management practices. That's precisely why we
asked KPMG Peat Marwick, a private accounting firm, to analyze our financial
systems and suggest improvements. We have already responded to the Peat
Marwick analysis in several fundamental ways.

We put new managers in charge of reforming financial operations and have
already implemented two major financial-systems reforms that should address
the questions raised in the audit.

I certainly agree with you that America's taxpayers deserve a better
financial-management system than the antiquated one that was used at DEA for
so many years and that's what they are getting.

One final point, I'd like to think that DEA's employees deserve a more
fairminded, evenhanded editorial than the one you wrote.

Thomas Constantine, Administrator, DEA, Department of Justice Washington,
D.C.

Checked-by: "Rolf Ernst"