FIGHT BREWS OVER HOUSE FEDS SEIZED IN DRUG CASE

Sides Disagree About Role Of Late Resident

In a case that netted the federal government some $10 million in
seized assets, a battle is brewing over a 49-year-old, two-bedroom
house in a modest East Knoxville neighborhood.

Regina Sawyer contends her late mother was a sainted caregiver who had
no clue her Selma Avenue house had been purchased with drug money.

The U.S. Attorney's Office counters that the late Linda Sue Sawyer was
a willing participant in a scheme to help prolific cocaine trafficker
Ronnie "Goodie" Rodgers hide the proceeds of his illegal trade.

Regina Sawyer told U.S. District Court Judge Thomas Phillips at a
hearing Thursday that she should be awarded her late mother's house.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Trey Hamilton insisted the house belongs to
the federal government.

The house was one of more than a half-dozen properties seized by
federal authorities in the probe of a Miami-to-Knoxville cocaine
trafficking conspiracy headed in Knoxville by Rodgers and his brothers
and led in Miami by Alexis Munoz.

Linda Sawyer was Rodgers' sister. When Munoz and the Rodgers brothers
were indicted two years ago in a conspiracy indictment, Linda Sawyer
also was charged. She was labeled in the indictment as a conspirator
not in the drug dealing but in money laundering.

In 2003, less than a year after she was indicted, Linda Sawyer died.
She was 57.

Since then, the Rodgers brothers, Munoz and a list of lower-level
players in a trafficking network described as one of Knoxville's
largest ever have pleaded guilty.

They agreed to give up millions in cash and assets bought with drug
money, including pricey Miami condominiums, Florida real estate and
more than $200,000 in Knoxville property, including the Selma Avenue
house now at issue.

Of the properties seized, the Selma Avenue house is the least
valuable. Federal authorities estimate its worth at $90,000. The Knox
County Property Assessor's Office has valued it at $59,100.

Hamilton insisted the battle over the roughly 1,400-square-foot
structure is not about money but principle. Linda Sawyer knew her
brothers were drug dealers and helped them hide their ill-gotten
gains, he argued.

Linda Sawyer's niece, Lekisha Perez, testified Thursday that her aunt
was illiterate but hard working, operating a day care and serving as a
caregiver.

"She took care of everybody," Perez said. "We didn't go to the grocery
store. We shopped out of her freezer."

She conceded Rodgers gave Linda Sawyer the Selma Avenue house, but she
insisted her aunt wound up paying Rodgers for the property because she
"didn't want to be a freeloader."

Hamilton asked if she could prove that.

"Documentation, as far as paperwork?" she responded. "No I honestly
believe that she purchased this home as an upright citizen. I don't
think she knew of any illegal dealings."

Sure, she said, Linda Sawyer and others in the family knew at least
one of the Rodgers brothers had a drug problem. But no one talked about it.

"They really never called its name," she said. "I'm calling its name.
That's (drug use) what it was."

Phillips suspended the hearing until Wednesday, Sept. 15, so Rodgers
and one of his brothers can be transported from jail to the federal
courthouse to testify.