Series: Part 1 Of 4

THE BIG-TIME, SMALL-TOWN DRUG TRAIL

Shortly before midnight on Feb. 7, a Virginia wildlife officer knocked on
Leo Hinson's door to say someone had been poaching on his land. Hinson
followed the officer outside, unaware that about a dozen lawmen were hiding
in the woods at his sprawling farm near South Boston.

Hinson appeared dumbfounded as lawmen emerged from the darkness to arrest
him on two counts of attempted murder, investigators say.

They say Hinson hired a hit man to kill witnesses set to testify that he
was the head of one of the biggest drug organizations in the Southeast.

Armed with a search warrant that night, investigators seized drugs, money,
weapons and financial records from Hinson's trailer.

They say a four-year investigation revealed that Hinson operated an
organization involved in murder, money laundering and drug distribution.
They also are investigating alleged corruption by government officials and
lawmen.

A federal grand jury indicted Hinson Thursday on eight counts, including
attempted murder.

Across the state line in North Carolina, Hinson's arrest barely made news.

But it was in this state, on a few acres near Newton Grove, that
authorities say Phillip Henry Barfield sold more than $1 million worth of
drugs for Hinson.

And it was here that investigators began putting together the pieces that
would tie Barfield to Hinson and Hinson to a multistate drug empire.

Investigators say Barfield was a lieutenant in Hinson's organization. Court
records say Barfield and others hauled the drugs in motor homes and other
vehicles from Georgia and Texas and stored them in Virginia and North Carolina.

Hinson's organization began to unravel four years ago with the arrest of
Barfield's biggest drug customer, Jamie Hewett of Supply.

On Feb. 18, 1998, Brunswick County sheriff's detectives stopped the Ford
Explorer that Hewett was driving near Shallotte. Inside, they found 11/2
pounds of marijuana and about a half ounce of cocaine.

Investigators found more drugs and financial records when they searched
Hewett's house.

Two months later, the 29-year-old Hewett was dead, two bullets in his back.

Investigators say Hewett never saw his assailant. He was unlocking a gate
at his father's trucking business when the killer fired a high-powered
rifle three times from a thicket about 200 feet away.

Witnesses said they heard the gunshots and the squeal of car tires, but
they never saw anything.

With little other evidence to go on, investigators started following the
drug trail.

Slowly, following one lead after another, that trail led to Barfield, a
Sampson County man with a penchant for drugs, younger women and violence.

On a windswept day last March, lawmen ended Barfield's 10 years as a major
drug dealer in Sampson, Johnston and Brunswick counties.

From January 1990 until his arrest on March 6, 2001, investigators say,
Barfield sold more than 11 pounds of cocaine, 220 pounds of marijuana and
17.5 ounces of methamphetamine.

On the same day Barfield was charged, lawmen arrested his wife, Charity,
and his father, Dennis. His brother Spencer would be arrested three months
later.

Dennis Barfield, a stroke victim, was deemed incompetent to stand trial.
Charity and Spencer Barfield got reduced sentences by agreeing to cooperate
with authorities and to testify against Phillip Barfield.

But in the end, just the threat of their testimony was enough. Shortly
before he was to go on trial, Barfield pleaded guilty to all eight counts
of drug trafficking and related charges. At age 44, he could be sentenced
to four life terms in a federal prison. Sentencing is scheduled for April
15 in Wilmington.

"He will die in prison," said Christine Dean, the U.S. attorney who
prosecuted him.

Investigators say Barfield and Hinson, who is 60, remain suspects in
Hewett's slaying. They say lawmen in Kansas are investigating whether the
homicides of a man and his wife there are connected to the Hinson drug
organization.

In Newton Grove and elsewhere, Barfield left behind a tangled mass of
broken lives.

They include the innocent family members of the people who will follow
Barfield to prison. They also include his first wife, who now lies in a
nursing home with severe brain damage.

"There is no telling how many people Phillip Barfield has got hooked on
drugs, how many lives he has destroyed," said Landis Lee, a Sampson County
sheriff's captain.

And although Barfield is in jail now, his name still evokes fear in some
Newton Grove residents.

An elderly couple who operate a business in town refused to discuss him.
The man said he could write a book about Barfield, but he is too afraid to
talk.

"Barfield," the man said, "dropped out of school because of recess. He
didn't like to play."

Life In The Fast Lane

Even as a teen-ager, Phillip Henry Barfield cut a large figure in Newton
Grove, an agricultural community with a traffic circle at its heart.

U.S. 701, U.S. 13 and N.C. 50-55 snake off the circle through vast fields
of tobacco, beans and cotton.

Barfield did not live in this town of 600 people. He lived on the outskirts
back then, just over the Johnston County line

But he liked to hang out around the circle in his blue Plymouth Road
Runner, a fittingly fast car for a kid living the fast life.

Landis Lee became a rookie Sampson County sheriff's deputy in 1974. It
didn't take him long to get acquainted with Barfield.

Back then, Lee said, Barfield's main crimes involved larcenies and traffic
violations.

"Minor stuff," Lee called it. "He had a reputation."

John Hayes, chief of Newton Grove's two-man police force in those days,
said Barfield used to get in trouble and then try to outrun police on the
back roads.

"He had no respect for the law," said Hayes, now a major with the Sampson
County Sheriff's Department.

Robert Mason, a former state trooper, recalled a night in 1978 when he
clocked Barfield driving about 90 mph on U.S. 701. Mason, now the Jones
County sheriff, said he chased Barfield from Smithfield to the
Johnston-Sampson county line, where Barfield crashed his car and ran away.
He was caught a few minutes later.

Mason said he charged Barfield with drunken driving, reckless driving and
speeding. A judge sentenced Barfield to three years of supervised
probation, court records show.

But the arrest only seemed to add to Barfield's allure. Hayes said
teen-agers flocked to him.

"He was a leader, a natural-born leader," Hayes said. "The kids would
follow him anywhere. Of course, he always led them down the wrong highway."

Lee said Barfield began selling drugs as a teen-ager.

"He was always out raising Cain, spending money," Lee said. "It don't take
a scientist to know that if you don't hold a job you don't walk around with
a pocket full of $100 bills."

By 1985, Barfield was deeply entrenched in the drug trade, and lawmen
wanted to root him out.

They had been building a case against Barfield for months, and by March of
that year they had enough evidence to bring him down.

Getting that evidence had not been easy, said John Connerly, then the lead
agent for the Sampson County drug team.

Barfield had a violent reputation. "Other drug dealers didn't want to talk
about him," Connerly said.

Eventually, undercover drug agents began to make buys from Barfield. But
investigators wanted more. They wanted Barfield to sell them enough cocaine
to keep him in prison for a long time.

On the night of March 12, 1985, lawmen arranged for Barfield and another
man to sell undercover agents 1.5 pounds of cocaine.

A cautious Barfield tried to set the place for the transaction in the
woods. Investigators said no; too secluded.

Connerly said lawmen knew Barfield would be armed. They had seen a
.357-caliber pistol in his waistband earlier that night. Connerly said he
also believes Barfield was either drunk or on drugs. Investigators didn't
want to take chances.

"There was a lot of talk that he would kill anybody who got in his way,"
Lee said.

Barfield named another meeting place, along a dirt road, but again
investigators declined. They wanted the deal to go down in the open.

Barfield and his partner finally agreed to meet in a parking lot at the
Newton Grove traffic circle around midnight.

As the drug agents moved in to make the arrests, Lee said, Barfield caught
on, exchanged gunfire with lawmen and ran.

Lee chased Barfield through a trailer park and got hit by a Newton Grove
police car, breaking his knee in the process. The injury cost him a year
out of work.

But the drug buy proved successful. The agents quickly caught Barfield and
his partner and put them in the Sampson County Jail. Bail for Barfield was
set at $1 million.

Shortly after their arrests, jailers discovered that Barfield and his
partner had made a weapon, apparently from steel wire torn from a jail
window. The two were transferred from Clinton to Raleigh.

Three months later, Barfield pleaded guilty to a single count of
trafficking cocaine. He received a 35-year prison sentence and a $250,000 fine.

But his stay in prison lasted just 31/2 years.

"It seemed like you could arrest him and arrest him and he always had ways

of beating the system," Lee said.

Tomorrow: Phillip Barfield can't stay out of trouble after his early release.