MCEACHERN FOLDS

District attorneys understand the old Kenny Rogers song:

You got to know when to hold 'em and know when to fold 'em.

On a drab April morning, in the shadow of the Swisher County Courthouse,
Terry McEachern glanced mournfully at his cards and decided to fold.

Until recently, every hand in the Tulia poker game had boiled down to a
swearing match between Coleman and the accused. Sheriff Larry Stewart
bolstered Coleman's reputation by labeling him "a man of integrity and
professionalism." Governor George W. Bush enhanced the impression by naming
the undercover man "Texas Lawman of the Year." Thus, the first two cards in
District Attorney McEachern's hand were the king and the ace of spades.

Defense counsel wasn't so lucky. Working on the theory that everybody looks
like a drug dealer first thing in the morning, police officers dragged
defendants from their beds and paraded them in front of the television
cameras in their underwear, their teeth unbrushed and their hair uncombed.
A local newspaper editor heightened the effect by calling the Defendants
"scumbags" and "known drug dealers." Defense attorneys started the game with
a three of clubs and a two of diamonds.

Lady luck was not always kind to Mr. McEachern. To the media, Tom Coleman
was Supernarc: a mythic figure who "walked the walk and talked the talk"
with snarling, gun toting drug lords so that blue-eyed babies could grow up
in a drug free world.

Unfortunately, the real Tom Coleman was a mystery man-the joker in the
deck. If some enterprising attorney yanked open Coleman's closet, only God
knew what skeletons might tumble out. Mr. McEachern left that closet door
undisturbed.

Now every gambler knows that the secret to survivin'
Is knowin' what to throw away and knowin' what to keep.

The Texas rules of evidence place an officer's professional history off
limits, unless a defense attorney demonstrates that a potential witness has
motive and opportunity to tamper with evidence or falsify testimony.
Realizing that Judge Ed Self would allow no scrutiny of Coleman's past, Mr.
McEachern breathed a sigh of relief and tossed his joker onto the discard
pile. The real Tom Coleman never set foot in the Swisher County District
courtroom. Instead, defense counsel had to reckon with Supernarc and the
District Attorney found himself holding the queen, the king, and the ace of
spades.

Unfortunately, agent Coleman failed to live up to his press clippings. On
the witness stand, he had trouble remembering his name if it wasn't entered
on the police report. When confronted with glaring inconsistencies in his
testimony, Supernarc just changed his story on the fly. Worse yet, several
defendants claimed they were working when the alleged drug deal went down
and had the time cards to prove it.

No matter! The prosecution only had to prove that the crime happened on or
about the day mentioned in Coleman's police report. As McEachern informed
the jury in the trial of Joe Moore, "on or about" means "any time prior to
the grand jury returning an indictment." So long as the deed was done during
the eighteen months Coleman was in Tulia, inconsistencies in the agent's
testimony were immaterial.

In fact, Coleman's errors and evasions in trial one couldn't be mentioned in
trial two. His blunders in trials one and two were inadmissible in trial
three, and so on. At the insistence of Judge Ed Self, each case was
hermetically sealed from the others. Prosecutor McEachern tossed a six of
hearts onto the discard pile and drew the coveted jack of spades.

In December of 1999, as treetops glistened and children listened to hear
sleigh bells in the snow, a jury filed into the Swisher County courtroom to
render a verdict in the case of Joe Welton Moore. A guilty verdict would
constitute a strong precedent, dealing Mr. McEachern the precious ten of
spades he needed to complete a royal flush. A not-guilty verdict was
unthinkable. Had one jury doubted Coleman's credibility subsequent juries
could easily follow suit. As it turned out, Mr. McEachern got his royal
flush and Joe Moore got ninety years.

Sixteen months later, Tanya Michelle White proves she was in Oklahoma the
day of the alleged crime. Big deal! Maybe Tom got his facts a bit jumbled,
or maybe the crime was committed a day earlier . . . or a month earlier . .
. or later. If any date between January of 1998 and July of 1999 was fair
game, why did Mr. McEachern fold so meekly?

Is the District Attorney saying that eight Swisher County juries got the
Coleman cases wrong? Perish the thought! "I believe the people of Swisher
County are the best people in the world," he told television reporters the
day the charges against Ms. White were dismissed. "They are good Christian
people, and I'm proud to be a part of them."

Has the Prosecutor lost faith in his star witness? Not at all! "I don't
think (Coleman) manufactured testimony intentionally," McEachern advised the
New York Times. Later he assured a Lubbock reporter that he believed
everything Coleman had told him, admitting only that the undercover man,
like every fallible mortal, "has made some mistakes."

But glaring inconsistencies have marred Coleman's testimony from the
beginning, so what's new? In February 2000, Billy Don Wafer proved he was
working when he was supposed to be selling drugs to Supernarc. But this was
at a probation revocation hearing, not a trial, and Judge Ed Self was
weighing the facts. "I'm not convinced by the preponderance of the evidence
presented today," the honorable Mr. Self concluded, "that the allegations in
the new motion to revoke are true."

Judge Self disagreed with eight Swisher County juries because he was privy
to the damning facts he had kept jurors from hearing: That a County Attorney
in Morton, Texas said he saw Coleman stealing gas. That a holy host of
Cochran County merchants had accused Mr. Coleman of walking the walk of a
con artist and talking the talk of a two-bit hustler. That the Sheriff of
Cochran County thought the undercover agent shouldn't be in law
enforcement. As if that weren't enough, Judge Self knew Coleman's testimony
had been a jumble of inconsistencies, improbabilities and outright lies from
the get-go. These disturbing facts returned Billy Wafer to his wife and
children.

In the trial of Kareem White in September 2000, it was back to business as
usual. Mr. Coleman told a Swisher County jury that he only made one
narcotics purchase on a single day. Then he related how he had purchased
drugs from Defendant A, inscribed the particulars on his leg, driven to
Amarillo (fifty miles away), filed his report, booked in his evidence, and
returned to Tulia to purchase narcotics from Defendant B, all within
forty-five minutes.

Grim faces circled the jury room as the deliberations began. Mr. Coleman
had inspired little confidence, but Mr. McEachern had left them with a stern
warning: if they returned a not-guilty verdict they were calling Sheriff
Stewart a liar. They respected and admired their Sheriff and didn't want to
embarrass him. Nor did they want to challenge the competency of jurors in
the first seven Tulia drug trials. Kareem's trial was just like the others
and they had all ended in guilty verdicts. Besides, two White kids had
already been convicted, and if they were guilty Kareem must be guilty too.
Mr. McEachern had laid down his cards with a flourish-nothing beats a royal
flush.

Most of the jurors could remember leaping to their feet as Kareem sped
across the goal line hoisting the football in triumph. They could still see
him running the anchor leg of the mile relay, leaving hapless rivals in his
wake as loyal Hornet fans cheered themselves hoarse. Kareem White was once
the toast of Tulia, and now this! Such a tragedy-such a waste! A grim-faced
jury filed back into the courtroom leaving an empty Kleenex box behind them.

Mr. McEachern won the Kareem White case in the Swisher County courtroom only
to suffer a stunning reversal in the court of public opinion. Attorneys and
reporters from across the nation knew about Cochran County. Having poured
over Coleman's testimony in all eight Tulia drug trials, they knew he was
telling a new lie every time he opened his mouth. The jury may have
swallowed the Supernarc mythology, but the folks in the cheap seats were
watching Pinocchio, his nose as long as a pool cue.

Swisher County jurors love their Sheriff as much as they hate drugs and drug
dealers. But they also believe in fairness and the principle of equality
before the law. Now that the truth about Tom Coleman has finally worked its
way to Tulia, Supernarc has melted away like the Wicked Witch of the West.
With nobody to place in the witness box but poor, befuddled Tom Coleman, Mr.
McEachern's royal flush has dwindled down to a pair of eights. So, content
with his string of convictions, Mr. McEachern lays down his cards, smiles
nervously, and strolls away from the table.

Not so fast, Mr. McEachern. Forty-six men and women have had the life
crushed out of them to insure your reelection. Mothers, fathers, sisters
and brothers live in anonymous agony so you could run unopposed in the last
election. Dozens of orphaned children have sacrificed a mother or a father
(often both) so you could rest easy at night.

And what of the good citizens of Tulia you claim to love so deeply? The sign
may say, "The richest land and the finest people," but that's not the
perception playing in the national press. True, the citizens of Swisher
County do not blame you for their sad plight, and perhaps they're right.
Maybe you aren't the real villain in this melodrama.

Perhaps the fault lies with the man who allowed the Supernarc mythology to
get rolling in the first place. The Honorable Ed Self set up this card game
and the hard questions must be laid at his feet. The rules of evidence were
so distorted that undeniable proof of innocence was a defendant's only hope.
Tanya Michelle White had the proof-most defendants did not.

A fair, judicious application of the rules of evidence would have given
defense attorneys a fighting chance. Just try to sell Tom Coleman to a jury
in Cochran County and see what happens. Or what about Ellis County where
Coleman was fired for trying to extort sexual favors from a confidential
informant, do you think jurors there would take the man seriously? Judge
Self couldn't trust jurors to sort things out for themselves so he rigged
the game in favor of the prosecution. The result: bogus convictions and
superficial charges of racism.

Mr. Self, the court of public opinion cannot be ignored forever. With legal
storm clouds massing on the eastern horizon it's time to cut your losses.
You have foisted a legal travesty on the people of Swisher County and should
make amends while there's still time. As the old song says:

You got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em,
Know when to walk away . . . and know when to run.