George:

On the Jesse Sheckler story, let me add some inside knowledge. I represented someone who was a defendant on the same indictment. The indictment was something of a hodge-podge. The only thing that the defendants listed on the indictment had in common is that they all were named by the same informant as someone with whom the informant had dealt drugs. One man who became an informant for the police had been dealing drugs -- buying them and selling them from many different people, many of whom did not know each other. It is true that drugs were seized -- even a lot of drugs. But most of what was seized was seized from the ringleader, who then became an informant to try to get a sentence reduction.

The informant was truly the center of the illegal activity. There was no showing that Sheckler had himself had any drug transactions with any of the other defendants. After setting up a number of other people, and causing them to get busted, the ringleader did in fact receive a sentence that was MUCH lighter than what he would have received had he gone to trial. My recollection is that he got 7 years instead of the 20+ years he would have received had he not testified against Jesse Sheckler and others. As not only a defense lawyer but a private citizen, it galls me when prosecutors give a ringleader a break for turning in his underlings, but that is another issue. All of the other people named in the indictment pled guilty except for Sheckler. When Sheckler went to court for the trial, his defense lawyer called as witnesses some of the other people who were named as being a part of the "conspiracy." They either didn't know who he was or they had never seen him with cocaine. Sheckler was acquitted of the conspiracy charge.

Federal law says that you can be charged with conspiracy to sell drugs without any showing that you ever actually had any drugs. A conspiracy is nothing more than an agreement -- if you and I were to agree that we would buy an ounce of crack, we have committed a crime of conspiracy even if we never actually have any crack. The government punishes us for making the agreement.

The problem for WVIR was that the first story was wrong in that it did not distinguish between the claims of conspiracy and the claims of actual possession or distribution. Later stories built on that "fact," and compounded the problem.

Lloyd Snook (electronic mail, May 27, 2003)