TEXAS ATTORNEY GENERAL OPENS AN INQUIRY INTO '99 DRUG SWEEP

HOUSTON, Aug. 28 - Attorney General John Cornyn of Texas has opened an
investigation into a 1999 drug sweep in which about 12 percent of the black
population of Tulia, Tex., was arrested. The decision failed to appease
civil rights lawyers, who describe the arrests in an undercover operation
as atrocities and want the convictions overturned.

Mr. Cornyn, who announced the investigation on Monday, suggested that he
had opened the inquiry partly because of confusion that had arisen this
month about whether the United States Justice Department was continuing its
own civil rights investigation of more than two years.

"The attorney general has grown concerned that there was some confusion
among some circles about whether the investigation was open and that it was
moving slowly," said Jane Shepperd, a spokeswoman for Mr. Cornyn.

The confusion arose after a Justice Department official described the
investigation as closed in a letter to the American Bar Association.
Justice Department officials now say that letter was "in error" and that
the investigation is continuing.

The announcement from Mr. Cornyn comes as he is running for a vacant seat
in the United States Senate against Mayor Ron Kirk of Dallas, who is trying
to become the state's first black senator. The Tulia cases have not become
a major issue in the Senate race, but groups including the NAACP Legal
Defense and Educational Fund Inc., the William Moses Kunstler Fund for
Racial Justice and the American Civil Liberties Union have criticized the
drug arrests as racially biased.

Vanita Gupta, a lawyer with the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, said the value of
a state investigation was limited, nearly three years after the drug sweep.
Instead, Ms. Gupta called on Mr. Cornyn to take control of the cases from
the local district attorney and either seek to overturn the convictions or
order new trials. She also said she was skeptical of Mr. Cornyn's motivations.

"It smacks too much like kind of a political solution for Cornyn, rather
than a genuine commitment," Ms. Gupta said. "Cornyn has known about these
cases for three years. If he wants to see justice done, then he knows that
he needs to take over these cases. These cases have become a national
embarrassment to Texas."

In July 1999, 46 people, all but 3 of them black, were arrested on drug
charges in Tulia, a town of about 5,000 people. In nearly every case, the
only evidence against the defendants was the testimony of a sole undercover
agent, Tom Coleman. Mr. Coleman did not use wiretaps for corroboration, and
records show he often filed shoddy reports and had a previous work record
in law enforcement that included a misdemeanor charge for stealing gasoline
from a county pump.

Jeff Blackburn, an Amarillo, Tex., lawyer representing more than 20
defendants in the cases, said that 13 people remained in jail on sentences
as long as 320 years. Mr. Blackburn said lawyers were filing motions
seeking new trials in every case.