MAN HALVES POSSIBLE SENTENCE IN DRUG-CASE PLEA DEAL

He Agrees To Testify Against Person He Says Set Him Up In Cocaine Sale

A Winston-Salem man who faced a possible 15 years in prison on
drug-trafficking charges reached a plea agreement with prosecutors
yesterday after he told jurors that he was manipulated by an
acquaintance into unknowingly participating in a drug deal.

Prosecutors, who had seen the same defense work six months before,
said they didn't want to take the chance that it would work again.

"We don't want this to be an effective defense," District Attorney Tom
Keith said. "We know now that this is in the popular mythology. We
will train law officers to do things which will pre-empt their ability
to use this defense."

Under the plea agreement, Ruben Rodriguez, 21, will serve a maximum of
seven years in exchange for agreeing to provide "substantial
assistance" to investigators and testify against the man who he said
set him up. That man, whose whereabouts are uncertain, has never been
charged.

Rodriguez had no previous criminal record, and Assistant District
Attorney Tim Severo said he thought that the sentence Rodriguez
received was appropriate.

"When someone is caught red-handed with a kilo of cocaine, we aim for
the archer, not the arrow," he said.

Rodriguez's case had another twist - police reports filed by officers
involved in the investigation are missing.

Officers who testified did not know what had happened to the reports,
which they said were handed over to the records department.

"I wish I had this great excuse that it's here or there, but records
just doesn't have it," said Detective Jeff Branham of the
Winston-Salem Police Department.

Keith said that his office has never had a case in which all the
reports had disappeared, but, he said, the missing reports did not
affect his decision to reach a plea agreement.

Rodriguez had been offered the same plea agreement before but did not
provide information about his acquaintance. He chose to take the
agreement yesterday rather than risk a guilty verdict, his attorney,
Chris Beechler, said.

During testimony Tuesday, Rodriguez told jurors the following through
an interpreter:

An acquaintance came to Rodriguez's apartment March 19, 2003, and
asked to borrow Rodriguez's car because his own was broken. Rodriguez
said yes and the acquaintance, whom he identified only as Daniel, took
the car for about half an hour.

Daniel also told Rodriguez that he was going out of town and asked if
a man who owed him money could leave it atRodriguez's apartment.
Rod-riguez agreed.

Later, Daniel called Rod-riguez and asked if he could meet the man at
a local Taco Bell restaurant. Rodriguez drove to the restaurant, and
as he pulled into the parking lot he received another call from
Daniel, telling him that there was a package under the seat to give to
the man. Rodriguez said he did not know what was in the package, which
contained a kilogram of cocaine.

When he parked his car next to one described by Daniel and spoke with
the driver, he was surprised by police officers who moved in to arrest
him. The driver of the other car was a confidential police informant.

"His excuse cut off everything," Keith said. "He goes there to pick up
some money for a friend, he'd never done this for the friend before,
he didn't have control of his car for part of the day. He has done a
good job of minimizing the state's chance in proving he was involved
and it wasn't a dupe."

Beechler and Severo interviewed jurors after they reached the plea
agreement. After hearing testimony from police officers involved in
the investigation and Rodriguez's account of what happened, some
jurors had doubts about Rodriguez's guilt, Beechler said..

"Several of the jurors said they actually believed that in a
tight-knit Hispanic community in Winston-Salem, a young man may do a
favor for his friend without understanding that he's being
manipulated," Beechler said.