UNDERCOVER JOB COSTS D.C. INFORMANT HIS LIFE

Victim Robbed, Beaten While Aiding Probe of Starbucks Slayings; 3 Men Charged

A drug user acting as an informant, trying to help D.C. police solve July's
triple homicide at a Starbucks coffee shop in Georgetown, was robbed and
beaten to death Thursday night outside a row house in Southwest Washington,
law enforcement sources said. They said the informant had gone to the house
to buy cocaine at the behest of investigators, who hoped to find grounds to
search the house and question occupants about the Starbucks case.

Three men were arrested yesterday evening in the informant's death, and in
a statement issued afterward, police said it appeared that the informant
Eric Butera, 31, of Alexandria had been attacked by several men who
robbed him and fatally beat him.

The three men arrested in his death none of them apparently a resident
of the house were charged with felony murder, police said. Additional
suspects were being sought, they said.

A police spokesman said he believed that the three men were giving
statements to investigators last night. He said he was not aware of any
connection between the three men and the Starbucks case.

Butera was found with severe head and face injuries a few minutes before 10
p.m. in the rear of the 1000 block of Delaware Avenue SW.

He was taken to George Washington University Hospital and pronounced dead
about an hour later.

Police sources, who described Butera as a cocaine user and informant, said
Butera had told D.C. homicide detectives that he believed occupants of the
Southwest Washington house had information about the Starbucks slayings.

The sources said detectives dropped off Butera near the house Thursday
night after giving him less than $100 in cash to make a drug purchase. The
detectives then parked near the house but not within sight of it and
waited for Butera to return, the sources said. How long they waited could
not be determined. He never came back.

Investigators often use informants to gather evidence with which to obtain
warrants so they can arrest drug dealers and search the places where they
do business. In some cases, informants are used to introduce undercover
officers to drug dealers; in other cases, informants are used to make
purchases. Police sources said Butera had been a regular customer of the
alleged dealers in the Delaware Avenue house, which is in the city's
Greenleaf Gardens public housing complex.

Law enforcement specialists said it also was not unusual for police to wait
for an informant out of sight so as not to be spotted by lookouts for
drug dealers. What happened Thursday night, they said, underscores the
danger of such "buybust" operations, which are carried out by police vice
investigators virtually every night in druginfested neighborhoods across
the city.

But informants and officers are rarely killed. And the underlying reason
for the operation also was unusual in this instance. Investigators were
seeking information in the July 6 slayings of three young employees who
were shot to death in a possible botched robbery at a Starbucks on
Wisconsin Avenue NW. The triple homicide in a fashionable part of town has
garnered national attention and placed detectives under pressure.

The lack of arrests in the Starbucks slayings has drawn criticism from
Starbucks Chief Executive Howard Schultz, who recently increased the reward
money in the case from $50,000 to $100,000 for information leading to the
arrest and conviction of those responsible for the slayings of Mary Caitrin
Mahoney, 25; Emory Allen Evans, 25; and Aaron David Goodrich, 18.

The three were shot in a back room of the shop after it closed July 6.
Their bodies were found near a safe that had not been opened.

Law enforcement sources stressed yesterday that they did not consider
Butera necessarily the key to unlocking the Starbucks mystery, but they
said his tip was interesting enough for them to pursue, just as they have
pursued hundreds of other tips. Several people in the Delaware Avenue house
were interviewed by homicide detectives after Butera's slaying; they
provided no helpful information about the executionstyle killings at
Starbucks, according to the sources.

After detectives dropped off Butera near the house Thursday night and
parked a few blocks away, they waited. It could not be determined yesterday
what time the operation began or how long they waited. But at 9:50 p.m., a
emergency 911 operator received a call about an unconscious person on
Delaware Avenue, and patrol cars were dispatched.

A police spokesman said last night that he understood that Butera was
beaten with fists and feet. The money that investigators had given him was
gone, and he had no drugs, the sources said.

His slaying brought an unusually large response from D.C. police. Dozens of
uniformed officers and detectives swarmed over the scene, far more police
than usual at a homicide. "He got whacked, and we don't like it when
someone working with us is killed," a police official said yesterday.

The suspects in Butera's death were identified by police as Robert William
Walker, 25, and Clifton Nathan Beynum, Jr., 24, both of the 1500 block of
Alabama Avenue SE, and Keith Mathis, 35, of no fixed address.

Police said they were arrested at various places in the city based on
information developed in an ongoing investigation. They were to be
presented today in D.C. Superior Court.

Police said Acting Chief Sonya T. Proctor has ordered a thorough
investigation of the incident and "a review of the procedures used in
connection with the case Eric Butera was assisting with."

Butera had been in and out of trouble since June 1993, when he was charged
with robbing a Virginia cabdriver, according to court records in
Alexandria. Butera pleaded guilty to grand larceny and was placed on
probation for five years.

Drugs played a part in that case. Butera hailed the taxi outside an
Arlington restaurant, where he worked as a waiter, and rode into the
District. He later told police that he bought $60 worth of cocaine in the
city. He then had the driver drive him to Alexandria. Rather than pay the
$35 fare, he attacked the driver. But he left his restaurant apron in the
cab, which led to his eventual arrest.

Butera had been jailed three times since 1993 as a probation violator after
testing positive for drug use and failing to take part in a treatment
program. A courtordered mental examination found that he had an antisocial
personality, a dependency upon cocaine and a pattern of alcohol abuse.

Staff writers Hamil R. Harris, Brian Mooar and Martin Weil contributed to
this report.