DRUG BUY SET UP FOR BUSH SPEECH
DEA LURED SELLER TO LAFAYETTE PARK
By Michael Isikoff
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, September 22, 1989
; Page A01
White House speech-writers thought it was the perfect visual for President
Bush's first prime-time address to the nation -- a dramatic prop that would
show how the drug trade had spread to the president's own neighborhood.
"This is crack cocaine," Bush solemnly announced, holding up a plastic bag
filled with a white chunky substance in his Sept. 5 speech on drug policy. It
was "seized a few days ago in a park across the street from the White House .
. . . It could easily have been heroin or PCP."
But obtaining the crack was no easy feat. To match the words crafted by the
speech-writers, Drug Enforcement Administration agents lured a suspected
District drug dealer to Lafayette Park four days before the speech so they
could make what appears to have been the agency's first undercover crack buy
in a park better known for its location across Pennsylvania Avenue from the
White House than for illegal drug activity, according to officials familiar
with the case.
In fact, when first contacted by an undercover DEA agent posing as a drug
buyer, the teenage suspect seemed baffled by the agent's request.
"Where the {expletive} is the White House?" he replied in a conversation
that was secretly tape-recorded by the DEA.
"We had to manipulate him to get him down there," said William McMullan,
assistant special agent in charge of DEA's Washington field office. "It wasn't
easy."
White House and DEA officials said they did nothing improper in their
efforts to help Bush illustrate how widespread the local trade is. A senior
White House official said the DEA was never asked to manufacture an arrest for
the president's speech.
According to DEA officials, the suspect had been the target of a
three-month undercover investigation before the White House request and had
sold crack to agents on three previous occasions in other parts of the city.
DEA officials said yesterday they have held off on arresting the suspect in
hopes that he would sell a larger amount of crack to undercover agents and
could be charged with a more serious offense.
"We were negotiating for a kilogram of crack and we were trying to identify
his organization," said McMullan. "We were going to make that undercover buy
anyway. What difference does it make where it happened -- whether it was in
front of the White House . . .or in front of the Supreme Court?"
DEA had planned to make an arrest this week, but the attempt fell through
when the suspect failed to show up for a scheduled meeting with a DEA
undercover agent. Another attempt will be made next week when a federal grand
jury is expected to return indictments against him and possibly some of his
confederates, said DEA spokesman Mario Perez.
Kevin Zeese, a defense lawyer who specializes in drug cases, said DEA's
efforts to maneuver the suspect to the area around the White House may enable
his lawyer to argue that he was a victim of "outrageous government conduct."
This would not help his defense against the three earlier crack sales,
Zeese said. Nevertheless, "I think it's disgusting," he said. "The situation
is not bad enough that they have to create a false situation? It's the
government creating a hoax so they can rev up the war effort."
As described by White House and DEA officials, the trail that brought crack
to the White House began last month in Kennebunkport, Maine, where the
president was on vacation and preparing for the speech that would unveil his
anti-drug program. The idea of the president holding up crack was included in
some drafts and Bush quickly approved. "He liked the prop," said one White
House aide. "It drove the point home."
Officials said that communications director David Demarest, who oversees
the speech-writers, then asked Cabinet affairs secretary David Bates to
contact the Justice Department about getting the drugs. Instructions to
Justice were to find some crack that fit the description in the speech, not to
go out and arrest someone just for the speech, aides said.
But little crack is actually sold around the White House, especially in
Lafayette Park, according to local law enforcement officials.
"We don't consider that a problem area," said Maj. Robert Hines, commander
of criminal investigations for the U.S. Park Police, which patrols the park.
"There's too much activity going on there for drug dealers . . . . There's
always a uniformed police presence there."
Hines said there have been about a half dozen arrests for marijuana
possession in the park this year, but no record of any crack dealing in the
park "except for that DEA buy."
The Justice Department official who got the White House call -- Richard
Weatherbee, a special assistant to Attorney General Dick Thornburgh
responsible for drug policy -- phoned James Millford, executive assistant to
DEA Administrator Jack Lawn. On Aug. 25, Millford called McMullan in the
Washington field office.
"Do you have anything going on around the White House?" McMullan recalled
Millford saying.
"I don't know about the White House," McMullan said he replied, but said
there was an undercover buy his agents were hoping to negotiate "four or five
blocks away."
"Any possibility of you moving it down to the White House?" Millford asked,
according to McMullan. "Evidently, the president wants to show it could be
bought anywhere."
Millford did not return phone calls from a reporter. Frank Shults, chief
public affairs spokesman at DEA headquarters, confirmed that Millford called
McMullan and asked if there were any active cases near the White House. The
location of undercover buys "are highly negotiable between the buyer and the
seller," he said. "That vicinity was as logical as any other location."
At that point, the undercover DEA agent called the suspect and attempted to
set up a meeting to buy crack in Lafayette Park. But making arrangements
proved difficult. At first, the suspect seemed not to know what or where the
White House was, McMullan said. When finally told it was the residence of the
president, he replied, "Oh, you mean where Reagan lives."
The meeting came off as planned. At about 11:30 a.m. on Sept. 1, the
undercover agent met the suspect and purchased three ounces of crack from him
for about $2,400, according to the DEA. Another DEA agent who was hiding
nearby took color photographs of the transaction, McMullan said.
But there was one more worry for the DEA: Since the suspect had not been
arrested, there was always the possibility that he would see Bush holding up
the crack on television, figure out what was going on and flee.
When Bush gave his speech on the evening of Sept. 5, McMullan and the
undercover agent were both at the White House. The undercover agent stood in
the Oval Office to maintain "chain of custody" over the crack -- a legal
phrase that refers to the government's requirement that it prove any drugs
presented in court as evidence are the same drugs used in the crime.
Meanwhile, McMullan was in a Secret Service command post, worried that the
suspect would be tipped off by Bush's speech.
"If there was a problem, we were going to take the guy right away,"
McMullan said. But, "he had absolutely no idea what went on."
Staff writer David Hoffman contributed to this report.
Articles appear as they were originally printed in The Washington
Post and may not include subsequent corrections.
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