Headline: Court gives police OK to make rock cocaine
By STUART PFEIFERThe Orange County Register

Santa Ana police did nothing improper when they manufactured rock cocaine
at a sheriff's laboratory in 1994 and sold it to drug suspects,an appellate
court has ruled.

The 4th District Court of Appeal in Santa Ana upheld the cocainepossession
conviction of Robert Ramos,who argued that the operation amounted
to"outrageous police conduct."

The decision reverses a 1995 ruling by Orange County Superior Court Judge
David O. Carter, who upheld Ramos conviction' but ordered police never
again to make their own rock cocaine.

"We are unable to perceive why the manufacture of rock from powder cocaine
taken from closed criminal cases is outrageous or violates due
process,"Associate Justice Thomas F. Crosby Jr. wrote in the decision.

Santa Ana police would not say if they are planning any new reverse sting"
operations,but the District Attorney's Office said it would embrace the
practice.

"There's nothing illegal about it.There's nothing outrageous about
it.That's what the police are paid to do,"said Deputy District Attorney
Carl Armbrust,head of the office's narcotics unit.

Santa Ana police arrested about 400 suspects during the 1994 operation near
Willow Junior High School.

"I hope they do it again,"said Jeff Ferguson,a deputy district attorney and
president of the county's narcotic officers association."It returned that
particular neighborhood to the people."

Critics said it was immoral for police to produce highly addictive rock
cocaineand noted that 142 pieces of rock cocaine were lost during the
operation.

"Were very disappointed by the ruling,'said Orange County Public Defender
Carl Holmes."It seems morally reprehensible to allow the police to
manufacture and sell drugs.