DRUG, POLICE CARS DECLARED A SURPLUS BY RAINBOW CITY

RAINBOW CITY - If you transport or deal drugs in Rainbow City your vehicle could
end up "for sale" in the city hall parking lot.

Three vehicles confiscated in drug seizures by the police department
were declared surplus and will be sold to the general public by sealed
bids, the City Council decided at Monday night's meeting.

Police Chief Morris Alexander announced that his department had been
given permission to sell or keep the vehicles by a judge following the
seizures of the vehicles from their former owners months ago. Only
council approval was needed, he said.

The vehicles - a white 1978 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme, a red 1992
Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme, and a white 1997 Toyota 4-Runner - were
each assigned minimum bid amounts. They were: $250 for the 1978
Oldsmobile, $750 for the 1992 Oldsmobile, and $10,000 for the Toyota.
The highest bid will be taken for each.

Police departments can take over ownership of "drug" vehicles at the
discretion of a state or federal judge after they file the necessary
paperwork with a civil court, police investigator Dale Walton said on
Tuesday.

Narcotics investigator Chaz Clifton, who worked the cases, said the
Toyota belonged to Dennis Young, a former chairman of the Attalla
Board of Education, who was arrested Sept. 15, 2000, outside an East
Gadsden drug store after making a drug deal. He later pleaded guilty
to trafficking in OxyContin and unlawful distribution of a controlled
substance just before his trial was to begin in 2002. Young served no
jail time but was ordered to pay fines of $50,000 and $2,500 on the
two charges as well as surrender his drivers license.

The Oldsmobiles were used in the transportation and selling of
methamphetamine by two other dealers, Clifton said.

Young's vehicle was difficult to confiscate because the day after he
was arrested he convinced a local credit union, which was apparently
unaware of the crime, to loan him money against the vehicle, which was
paid for, Clifton said.

Clifton praised Alabama's Controlled Substance Act, which allows the
seizures in civil courts, as a valuable tool for police. He said
dealers occasionally get light sentences because of prison
overpopulation and other factors so seizures are another way of
sending those dealers a message.

"We are trying to hurt the drug dealers anyway we possibly can,"
Clifton said. "We are also filing seizures on houses." He said the
department would be essentially "arresting" the property that was used
in a drug crime.

Three other vehicles - 1995, 1996 and 1997 police cruisers - were also
declared surplus by a council vote at the Monday's meeting. The Ford
Crown Victorias will not be sold immediately, however, because
Alexander said he is researching the possibility of trading them in on
a cargo van. He said he wants a van to be converted for the
department's special response team to use when it encounters crisis
situations in the city.