TEXAS DEFENDANTS RELEASED

Judge Says Accused Were Railroaded by Undercover Agent

TULIA, Texas - Breathing free air for the first time in four years,
26-year-old Kizzie White stood before a window on the third floor of
the Swisher County Courthouse, hugged her two children and waved at
the crowd that had gathered on the plaza below.

On the parking lot, Joe Moore, 64, talked about the days he spent
folding socks in the laundry room at the Robertson Unit near Abilene
and said, "I just want to get on with my life."

Moments earlier, they were among 12 people who were set free in an
anticipated but dramatic turn in a chain of events that began with a
controversial drug sting in the summer of 1999.

Setting personal recognizance bonds, which required them to post no
money, visiting District Judge Ron Chapman told them they were free
with "no special conditions other than that you keep in contact with
your attorneys."

The hearing took only 22 minutes and included brief statements from
four of the 15 defense attorneys present, most of which were an attack
on Tom Coleman, the undercover agent on whose word 38 convictions were
obtained.

"It is a tragedy that brings all of us here today," said Mitchell
Zanoff, a Washington, D.C., attorney whose firm worked on the cases
without pay. "It is a tragedy that 13 individuals have been sitting in
jail on unconstitutional convictions. It is a tragedy that Tom Coleman
ever set foot in Swisher County."

The 13th defendant was technically freed on bail in the Tulia case but
remains in custody on a drug charge in Potter County.

Coleman conducted an 18-month sting for the Panhandle Drug Task Force
that resulted in 46 arrests and 38 convictions. Thirteen were still in
prison last spring when Chapman, following two weeks of hearings,
determined that Coleman was "a racist" and "not a credible witness
under oath."

Chapman recommended to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals that all
the convictions be overturned. That court took no action, so the
Legislature passed a bill by Democratic state Sen. John Whitmire to
allow Chapman to release them and Gov. Rick Perry signed it.

More than 200 spectators packed the courtroom and 100 or more gathered
outside. The crowd, in fact, had begun gathering since early morning.

At 10:10 a.m., a white prison bus, the windows shielded by perforated
metal plates, pulled up to the south side of the courthouse and family
members gathered around, listening to whoops from the inmates inside.

Mattie White watched her daughter through the door window.

"She doesn't look right," White said through tears. "I'll have to
fatten her up."