65 STATE CASES DROPPED DUE TO DEPUTY PROBE

The Davidson County District Attorney's Office has dismissed 65 criminal
cases investigated by three county narcotics officers now charged in a
federal indictment with conspiracy to distribute drugs.

District Attorney Garry Frank said the cases, involving about 25
defendants, include not just drug possession allegations but also some drug
trafficking and habitual felon charges - cases his office normally gives
high priority.

"To have to dismiss these is extremely regrettable and distasteful," Frank
said.

He said his staff, which started the review the day after the arrest of the
three narcotics officers, has finished going over every pending Superior
Court case, as well as a few District Court cases, in which the three
officers - 1st Lt. David Scott Woodall, Lt. Doug Westmoreland and Sgt.
William Monroe Rankin - are involved.

The District Attorney's Office then filed papers with the Clerk of Court's
Office dismissing the cases. In most cases, the papers cited unavailability
of witnesses as the reason for dismissal.

In an interview, Frank declined to discuss how the pending federal charges
might affect the officers' credibility if they took the witness stand in a
local drug case. As a practical matter, the officers are being held without
bond in the Forsyth County Detention Center and can't get out to testify
anyway.

"At this point in time, they're just like anybody else - they're innocent
until proven guilty," Frank said. "But right now and for the foreseeable
future, they're unavailable to testify."

The dismissed cases include highly publicized marijuana-growing charges
against a couple who operate a local day care center.

Because of the dismissals, the Davidson County Detention Center released a
half-dozen defendants last week, Frank said.

His staff members are still checking for other pending District Court cases
involving the three narcotics officers, who were high-ranking officers in
the Davidson County Sheriff's Office vice and narcotics unit.

During a news conference last week, Sheriff Gerald Hege said, altogether, a
total of 91 cases involving 35 defendants were pending. Better to dismiss
the cases than leave any question about their validity hanging over them,
Hege said.

But the cases in state court might be just part of the problem. Federal
drug cases also could be affected. The three narcotics officers
investigated a number of cases that federal authorities took jurisdiction
of for prosecution in the federal courts, Frank said.

The indictment of the officers could conceivably be cited in appeals by
defendants who have been convicted, either in state or federal court. If a
defendant won a new trial, the officers would almost certainly not be able
to testify again. Friends and lawyers of convicted drug defendants last
week were seeking copies of newspaper stories about convictions or about
the recent indictments.

After an eight-month investigation by the FBI and the State Bureau of
Investigation, a federal grand jury on Dec. 7 indicted Woodall, 34,
Westmoreland, 49, and Rankin, 32, as well as Archdale police Sgt.
Christopher James Shetley, 41, and two Lexington-area residents, Wyatt
Nathan Kepley, 26, and Marco Aurelio Acosta-Soza, 25, for allegedly
conspiring to distribute cocaine, marijuana, steroids and Ecstasy.

According to a federal affidavit issued in the case, law enforcement
officers abused their authority in one or more ways, including writing fake
search warrants, planting evidence and fabricating charges, keeping drugs
and money seized during arrests, attempting to extort more money from the
people arrested, and intimidating suspects and potential witnesses.

All six defendants entered pleas of innocent in U.S. District Court in
Winston-Salem.

William Keesler can be reached at 249-3981, ext. 221, or at
bill.keesler@the-dispatch.com.