Paper Admits CIA Series' Drawbacks

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) The executive editor of the San Jose Mercury News
admitted to shortcomings in the newspaper's controversial series on the crack
cocaine explosion in Los Angeles in the 1980s.

In an open letter to readers in the newspaper's editorial section Sunday,
Jerry Ceppos said the newspaper solidly documented that a drug ring
associated with the Contra rebels in Nicaragua sold large quantities of
cocaine in innercity Los Angeles, and that some of the profits from those
sales went to the Contras.

However, he said, the threepart ``Dark Alliance'' series, published last
summer, occasionally omitted important information and created impressions
that were open to misinterpretation.

``I believe that we fell short at every step of our process in the writing,
editing and production of our work. Several people here share that burden,''
he wrote. ``We have learned from the experience and even are changing the way
we handle major investigations.''

The series, written by reporter Gary Webb, reported that a San Francisco Bay
area drug ring sold cocaine in South Central Los Angeles, then funneled
profits to the Contras for the better part of a decade. The series traced the
drugs to dealers Danilo Blandon and Ricky Ross, leaders of a CIArun
guerrilla army in Nicaragua.

The reports sparked widespread anger in the black community toward the CIA,
as well as numerous federal investigations into whether the CIA took part in
or countenanced the selling of crack cocaine to raise money for Contras.

The investigations never found that the CIA had any link to drug dealing.
Several newspapers also disputed the Mercury News report.

Ceppos wrote that while the newspaper did not report the CIA knew about the
drug operations, it implied CIA knowledge.

``Although members of the drug ring met with Contra leaders paid by the CIA
and Webb believes the relationship with the CIA was a tight one, I feel that
we did not have proof that top CIA officials knew of the relationship,'' he
wrote. ``I believe that part of our contract with readers is to be as clear
about what we don't know as what we do know.

``We also did not include CIA comment about our findings, and I think we
should have.''

Ceppos also said the series omitted conflicting information that Blandon
testified he stopped sending cocaine profits to the Contras at the end of
1982, after being in operation for a year. That information, Ceppos said,
``contradicted a central assertion of the series'' and should have been
included.

The editor also said the series reported the profit figures from the drug
sales as fact when they were estimates, and unfairly suggested the drugs
funneled to Los Angeles played a critical role in the crack problem in urban
America.

``Because the national crack epidemic was a complex phenomenon that had more
than one origin, our discussion of this issue needed to be clearer,'' Ceppos
said.

Ceppos said the paper reexamined the series with seven other reporters and
editors. He noted that Webb disagreed with his conclusions.