CREDIBLE SOURCE?

To the editor:

I read the article in Tuesday's paper regarding the suspension of
Lawrence's "top drug officer." According to the article, Judge Malone says
the court "would not have considered the information attributed to the
confidential informant as reliable," had he been specifically told the
informant had been convicted of drunken driving three times, felony theft
two times, forgery once and bad checks once.

On the other hand he confirms that he was told the informant's past
included a few "traffic-type things, driving on a suspended license ... a
lot of domestic-type things. A lot of failure to appears or failure to
complies. There was a theft." Forgive me for being so naive, but if Judge
Malone found this informant reliable based on what he was told, at what
point did these other issues convince him otherwise?

Terry Jacobsen,

Lawrence