SPECIAL 'SOLDIERS' WAGING WAR ON DRUGS

ASHEBORO - We heard about them last weekend but, if they do their job
as planned, we won't be hearing a lot more.

That's because a special team of officers involved in recent Randolph
County drug busts must wage the war on drugs under a veil of secrecy
and anonymity.

The sheriffs of Guilford, Alamance, Forsyth, Davidson, Caswell and
Randolph counties are calling their new effort in drug enforcement the
Superstars Task Force.

The six-member group, with one officer assigned from each county,
works out of an undisclosed location. Their identities are withheld
from the public because of the undercover and surveillance work they
have to do in order to follow drug buyers and distributors throughout
the area.

Last Saturday, members of the task force aided the vice and narcotics
unit of the Randolph County Sheriff's Office in raiding marijuana
"stash houses" in Asheboro and Seagrove, making five arrests. Three
pounds of cocaine, 102 pounds of marijuana, digital scales, six
weapons, two vehicles and a money counting machine were seized during
the course of the raids along with jewelry and $77,900 in currency.

"The task force is new, and it's up and running," Randolph County
Sheriff Litchard Hurley said Friday.

"These are law enforcement officers with years of experience in drug
enforcement in their counties. We just point them in the direction we
want them to go in and turn them loose."

Hurley said the idea behind Superstars was to form a group of deputies
who can ignore county jurisdictional lines while investigating drug
allegations.

As the brainchild of Guilford County Sheriff B.J. Barnes, the
Superstars Task Force was formed only two months ago in January.

"We're putting our jurisdictional turf battles aside," Hurley said.
"The bad guys have a network that ignores county lines. We now have a
force that can ignore them, too. None of us (the six sheriff
departments) are concerned with who gets the credit for a drug arrest.
We just want to get the drugs off our streets."

Barnes said Friday that he had thought up a multi-county drug task
force several years ago. Snags in starting one ended with the November
election of Sheriff Terry Johnson in Alamance County, Barnes said.

"Alamance County was the hub for a lot of our drug problems in
Guilford County because of the large Hispanic population living there.
I couldn't get the previous sheriff of Alamance to get involved.
Before January, we were basically trying to kill the snakes but
weren't getting into the snake pit."

With Alamance County on board, Barnes said the way was paved to follow
drug-carrying vehicles up the main traffic corridors in the central
part of the state.

The task force members first met each other in early January,
developed a working relationship, and brought the two biggest drug
cases from their respective counties with them into the project.

Barnes said a detective holding the rank of sergeant oversees the task
force - with the blessings of the sheriffs involved. Each agency,
Hurley said, supplied $25,000 in drug-seized money as funding to make
drug buys.

As each officer develops a case against a suspect, the task force
meets weekly to determine which case is the most well developed. The
other task force officers drop their work, temporarily, and all of
them focus on the one case until it's completed.

The Superstars can work on a case without notifying the sheriff
involved that they are in their county. All the "red tape" has been
taken care of.

"They (the task force) all do the surveillance work, make the drug
buys and the other things they do," Barnes said. "They all work as a
unit. Then, just before busting out (making a raid or arrests), they
contact the vice and narcotics unit of the local sheriff's office.
They let the local deputy assigned know everything they know. Once the
local officer is on board and working with the team, the task force
takes the target down. The local officer files the warrants, collects
the evidence, makes the charges and follows the case through the
courts. For the task force - think of them as the Lone Ranger - it's
Hi-Yo Silver, and away they go to the next case."

Because the local vice and narcotics unit is taking the case to court,
the Superstars Task Force is not weighted down by paperwork, Barnes
said. They only have to be on standby to testify during a trial, and
are free to go back to the cases they are working.

And, Barnes said, the Superstars Task Force was designed to go after
the big suppliers and develop enough evidence that many cases should
wind up in Federal court.

"We let the local vice officers buy at the local level," Barnes said.
"We can buy hundreds of pounds of drugs, then follow the suspect and
follow the money."

Both Barnes and Hurley said the drug dealers they are targeting
through the Superstars Task Force are well-organized and
well-financed. The dealers come from all walks of life and can even be
your next-door neighbor.

Both sheriffs related stories of drug buys made in parking lots of
major shopping centers. Both said that such organized criminals use
public places to meet shipments of drugs coming into the area. The
drivers are told to wait in the business while the dealers take the
truck or van to the "stash house" to unload. Then, the vehicle is
returned to the driver. If the drivers are stopped by authorities for
any reason, they have no idea where the drugs were taken.

Or, if the driver is a member of the group bringing drugs into the
area, that driver will only be taken to one "stash house" each time he
brings drugs into the area. If he is arrested, he only knows of one
place the drugs were taken.

Such "stash houses" can be anywhere. It can be an actual house rented
by the dealers. It can be an abandoned trailer. It can be a
self-storage unit.

Barnes said another tactic used by dealers is to follow the
drug-carrying vehicle in several other vehicles on the highways. If
the drug-carrying vehicle is stopped for some reason, a following
vehicle speeds by in such a reckless manner that the officer has no
choice but to leave the stopped vehicle and give pursuit.

Following those involved in the drug trade takes time and is dangerous
work. That is why the Superstars Task Force is veiled in secrecy.

"You'll only hear from the task force when we have followed one lead
as far as we can take it," Barnes said. "Like the one last weekend.
That wasn't the first, but it was taken as far as we could go with the
leads. The guys are back at work and have another case pretty well
along. We (all the departments involved) have already made our money
back."

News releases won't be issued every time the Superstars Task Force is
involved in a drug case. But, Barnes and Hurley said, the sheriffs
will hold yearly press conferences to report on the task force's activities.

"This task force is made up of very aggressive people who are trying
to make cases based on long-term relationships with very dangerous
people," Barnes said. "It can take six or seven months to do the
surveillance work and undercover buys to make a case."

Hurley added: "If we can tell you about it, we will. Otherwise, you
won't hear anything until we give our annual reports."