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46–528 CC 1998

REPORT FROM THE FRONT LINE: THE STATUS

OF NORTHEAST TEXAS’ FIGHT AGAINST DRUGS

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, 

INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS, AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT 

REFORM AND OVERSIGHT 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED FIFTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

JULY 21, 1997

Serial No. 105–83

Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform and Oversight

(

(II)

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM AND OVERSIGHT 

DAN BURTON, Indiana, Chairman 

BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York 

J. DENNIS HASTERT, Illinois 

CONSTANCE A. MORELLA, Maryland 

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut 

STEVEN SCHIFF, New Mexico 

CHRISTOPHER COX, California 

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida 

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York 

STEPHEN HORN, California 

JOHN L. MICA, Florida 

THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia 

DAVID M. MCINTOSH, Indiana 

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana 

JOE SCARBOROUGH, Florida 

JOHN B. SHADEGG, Arizona 

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio 

MARSHALL ‘‘MARK’’ SANFORD, South 

Carolina 

JOHN E. SUNUNU, New Hampshire 

PETE SESSIONS, Texas 

MICHAEL PAPPAS, New Jersey 

VINCE SNOWBARGER, Kansas 

BOB BARR, Georgia 

ROB PORTMAN, Ohio 

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California 

TOM LANTOS, California 

ROBERT E. WISE, JR., West Virginia 

MAJOR R. OWENS, New York 

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York 

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania 

GARY A. CONDIT, California 

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York 

THOMAS M. BARRETT, Wisconsin 

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, Washington, 

DC 

CHAKA FATTAH, Pennsylvania 

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland 

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio 

ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH, Illinois 

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois 

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts 

JIM TURNER, Texas 

THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine 

HAROLD E. FORD, JR., Tennessee 

———

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont 

(Independent) 

KEVIN BINGER, Staff Director 

DANIEL R. MOLL, Deputy Staff Director 

WILLIAM MOSCHELLA, Deputy Counsel and Parliamentarian 

JUDITH MCCOY, Chief Clerk 

PHIL SCHILIRO, Minority Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS, AND CRIMINAL

JUSTICE

J. DENNIS HASTERT, Chairman 

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana 

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut 

STEVEN SCHIFF, New Mexico 

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida 

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York 

JOHN L. MICA, Florida 

JOHN B. SHADEGG, Arizona 

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio 

BOB BARR, Georgia 

THOMAS M. BARRETT, Wisconsin 

TOM LANTOS, California 

ROBERT E. WISE, JR., West Virginia 

GARY A. CONDIT, California 

ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH, Illinois 

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York 

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland 

JIM TURNER, Texas 

EX OFFICIO

DAN BURTON, Indiana HENRY A. WAXMAN, California 

ROBERT CHARLES, Staff Director 

SEAN LITTLEFIELD, Professional Staff Member 

IANTHE SAYLOR, Professional Staff Member 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

Hearing held on July 21, 1997 ............................................................................... 1

Statement of: 

Coggins, Paul E., U.S. attorney, northern district of Texas ......................... 13

Marshall, Donnie R., Chief of Operations, Drug Enforcement Administration; and Julio F. Mercado, Special Agent in Charge, Dallas Divisional 

Office, Drug Enforcement Administration .................................................. 42

Yarbrough, Kenneth R., chief of police, city of Richardson, TX .................... 74

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by: 

Coggins, Paul E., U.S. attorney, northern district of Texas, prepared 

statement of ................................................................................................... 19

Marshall, Donnie R., Chief of Operations, Drug Enforcement Administration, prepared statement of .......................................................................... 50

Mercado, Julio F., Special Agent in Charge, Dallas Divisional Office, 

Drug Enforcement Administration, prepared statement of ....................... 50

Sessions, Hon. Pete, a Representative in Congress from the State of 

Texas, prepared statement of ....................................................................... 10

Souder, Hon. Mark E., a Representative in Congress from the State 

of Indiana, prepared statement of ............................................................... 4

Yarbrough, Kenneth R., chief of police, city of Richardson, TX, prepared 

statement of ................................................................................................... 77

(1)

REPORT FROM THE FRONT LINE: THE STATUS OF NORTHEAST TEXAS’ FIGHT AGAINST 

DRUGS 

MONDAY, JULY 21, 1997 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, INTERNATIONAL

AFFAIRS, AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE, 

COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM AND OVERSIGHT, 

Mesquite, TX. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:48 a.m., at West 

Mesquite High School, Mesquite, TX, Hon. Mark Souder (vice 

chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Present: Representatives Souder and Sessions. 

Staff present: Sean Littlefield and Ianthe Saylor, professional 

staff members; and Teresa Austin, full committee clerk. 

Mr. SOUDER. The Subcommittee on National Security, International Affairs, and Criminal Justice will come to order. 

Before we get underway, I want to say what an honor it is to be 

here in Mesquite as the guest of West Mesquite High School. We 

appreciate the hospitality. Many of our best hearings around the 

country have been in high schools and it gives us an opportunity 

to see what is going on in the schools and have a number of students—particularly during the school year—participate and observe 

how a congressional hearing works. 

Let me also say to the members of this community that you have 

one of the hardest working Members of Congress representing you 

in Washington, DC. I have been well aware of Pete Sessions’ concerns about rising drug use in America and am very pleased that 

he is part of this important field hearing here today. 

I would especially like to thank Pete for helping us pass the 

Drug Free Communities Act of 1997. This bill, one that we had 

worked on for a number of years, establishes a program to support 

and encourage local communities in their efforts to reduce substance abuse among our youth. It will go a long way to bringing 

communities and resources together to keep drugs away from our 

children. 

With that said, I would now like to make a brief opening statement. 

Today, we will be examining the dire threat of drugs to our communities. It is a sad fact, but a harbinger of the times, that no 

young person in any community in America is out of the reach of 

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2

nity immune from the drug violence, street gangs and trafficking 

to teens which accompany the arrival of these poisons in our midst. 

We have held hearings in New England, we have held hearings 

in Chicago, in the Detroit area and in Indiana. We have held hearings in the southwest and central and south Florida, in several 

parts of California, all over this Nation, and seen very similar 

types of problems with local variations. This problem is devastating 

and will require effort by all of us to reverse. We must do a better 

job of educating them about the dangers of these drugs, and protecting them from those who traffic in these poisons. 

We must wake up to our collective responsibility in meeting this 

collective threat—and get serious about fighting drugs. On behalf 

of the U.S. House leadership, this subcommittee began trying to 

pull together Republicans and Democrats committed to finding real 

and lasting solutions to our Nation’s drug problems. During the 

time we have been involved in this effort, this subcommittee has 

traveled throughout our Nation to see how drug use is being combatted. 

We have also consciously looked for solutions in the places where 

these dangerous drugs are produced, including remote and dangerous places in South America. Both last year and this year, I, 

along with others from our subcommittee, traveled in Colombia and 

Peru, Bolivia, Panama and Mexico. We have learned a lot about 

the nature of the drug problem in America and abroad, but one 

item stands out. Every aspect of the drug war is interconnected—

one aspect hooks it together like a chain link fence, and we have 

to attack every link in that fence. The success or failure of our policies in any specific area drastically affects the success or failure of 

our policies in all areas, whether it is treatment, prevention or law 

enforcement. 

Today, I am pleased to say, Washington is waking up to the 

problem. Our subcommittee has worked hard in the past year to 

change Washington’s thinking on this issue, and I think we are 

succeeding. We are rededicating ourselves to fighting drugs on all 

fronts as this Nation once did during the heyday of the Reagan administration’s ‘‘War on Drugs’’ and ‘‘Just Say No’’ campaigns. 

Today, I think we will learn about the threat drugs pose, and I 

hope this wisdom can be used in Washington. We must take this 

knowledge and build new partnerships between governments, businesses, schools, churches and families to fight drugs. We must reinforce efforts that are working, and learn how to translate local successes into national victories. 

If we fail in our efforts to destroy drugs where they are produced 

in South America, more drugs reach our streets. If we fail to interdict those drugs in transit through the Caribbean, along our Southwest Border with Mexico, or on our northern border along the 

Great Lakes, more drugs reach our streets. If we fail to coordinate 

the efforts of law enforcement personnel at the Federal, State and 

local level, more drugs reach our streets, schools and kids. If we do 

not educate our kids to say no to drugs and no to gangs, the market for drugs on our streets grows, as does the number of those 

willing to sell drugs. If we fail to effectively treat those who are on 

drugs and need our help, they will continue their destructive cycle 

of drug use, despair, crime and demoralization. It is all one big picVerDate jul 14 2003 10:19 Dec 05, 2003 Jkt 010199 PO 00000 Frm 00006 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 W:\DISC\46528 46528
3

ture and we cannot make the mistake of ignoring or neglecting any 

part of this puzzle, as we have so often done in the past. We must 

fight on all fronts and we must fight to win. 

I would now like to recognize Congressman Sessions for his opening statement. 

[The prepared statement of Hon. Mark E. Souder follows:]

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Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Chairman, thank you so much, and on behalf 

of all people from the Fifth District of Texas, I welcome you to 

Texas and want to thank you not only for being here today, but for 

your fight against drugs. 

I would like to have an opening statement if I could, Mr. Chairman. 

First of all, what I would like to do is once again thank you for 

your participation and your trip down here to Mesquite, TX and 

the metropolitan area of Dallas. I can tell you in my short time of 

being in Congress, I have admired the tireless work that this subcommittee does across not only the United States but the globe in 

its fight against illegal drugs. It is an area of government and law 

enforcement that gets beaten up a great deal, but they deserve not 

only our support but also our continued encouragement, and I 

think they deserve a strong thank you, not only from Congress, but 

from each one of us. 

So what today is all about is an opportunity for us to be together, 

to hear where we are currently on fighting drugs, not only in Texas 

and north Texas but also in the United States today, with an opportunity to say thank you to law enforcement. Also, for us to take 

back the message that is heard today to Washington that will result in not only better laws, but also the opportunity for us to effectively give you the resources that are necessary. 

The importance of this is that drugs are rampant in our country; 

they are everywhere. They are rampant in north Texas. Cocaine 

availability is up, marijuana use is widespread. Heroin use, incredibly, is on the rise throughout this country, and methamphetamine 

made right here in north Texas, Oklahoma and Missouri are readily available in this area. 

Today, we are going to hear from those heroes in the fight 

against this onslaught. Those who will testify before this subcommittee are those who I consider to be among the best in the 

country in the war on drugs. They have the expertise and the resources to push back the continuous flow of illegal narcotics into 

this and every community in this country. What they also have is 

the conviction and the will. I think that what you will find out as 

you hear this testimony today is that these are men and women 

who have been involved in law enforcement throughout their lives 

and they are here to protect our citizens from the insidious effects 

of drugs. 

The first witness that we will hear from is my good friend, Paul 

Coggins. Mr. Coggins is the U.S. attorney for the northern district 

of Texas and he has done yeoman’s work in keeping drug dealers 

behind bars and also working with communities in areas to fight 

and combat drugs and drug addiction. Also, we will have before us 

today officials from the Drug Enforcement Administration known 

as the DEA. The DEA is one of our Federal Government’s most 

successful agencies. And I want to make sure that everybody 

knows that I consider this a compliment. Sometimes when we talk 

about government, it is not in the best of terms, but I can tell you 

that the DEA is a friend of not only the taxpayer but also parents 

and law-abiding citizens of our country. 

The folks at DEA are everywhere in the fight against narcotics 

and they have assured me that they are ready to fight with every 

7

city and every community that asks for help, not only in the State 

of Texas, but across this country. That level of commitment is going 

to be shown, as you will see, today by Donnie R. Marshall, the current Chief of Operations at the DEA. And he is just an incredible 

man. He has a law enforcement career that began in 1969 as Special Agent in Dallas with the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous 

Drugs, which was the predecessor for the DEA. Please know, Mr. 

Marshall, that we are delighted that you are here today and please 

accept from us the gratitude of people not only of the United States 

but also in this metropolitan area of Dallas. 

I am also looking forward to the expertise that will be shared 

with us from Julio Mercado, Special Agent in Charge of the Dallas 

Field Division of the DEA. Agent Mercado can give us his unique 

perspective on both drug trafficking through Texas and the Caribbean, as well as drug prevention efforts, which I understand that 

the DEA will become more involved in as we work to sustain efforts to keep drugs off of our street and out of our children’s hands. 

Finally, this subcommittee will have the honor of hearing from 

another one of my good friends and a person who I have admired 

for many years, the Chief of Police from Richardson, Ken 

Yarbrough. Chief Yarbrough’s expertise is extensive as it relates to 

fighting drugs and crime, and I am looking forward to listening, as 

I have done for many years, to Chief Yarbrough and how he has 

an insightful perspective on the effects of drugs, drug traffickers 

and also the effect on local communities. 

The purpose of this hearing, as Chairman Souder has said, is to 

describe the focus of this work on the committee and of course, it 

is, to me, an opportunity for me to hear first-hand from law enforcement officials about the problem, the fight and the solutions 

that they see that we need. 

I think you will agree that with Congressman Souder being here, 

there is no question that we can take back the very best that could 

be offered in America, the problems that we face here in north 

Texas and will result in positive things in Washington, DC. 

I hope that we will also recognize that this is a complex problem, 

this is not one that will be solved overnight. It is going to take not 

only diligence on the part of the DEA, the U.S. attorney and local 

law enforcement, but it is also going to take those people like us, 

Congressman Souder and myself, to understand how complex the 

problem is. 

I would like to say that these local initiatives that have been undertaken here are innovative. They deal with the guts of the problem because law enforcement is out working with people in the 

community to try and resolve these problems. One example is that 

the DEA has formed a partnership with Wal-Mart. They have gone 

to Wal-Mart to try and prevent the selling of illegal over-thecounter products, such as—and I am going to have to stumble 

through these words, they are not as easy to pronounce as some 

might assume—but Pseudoephedrine and Phenylpropanolamine—

got through that. I am sure that Agent Mercado could correct me 

very carefully because you deal with those words every day, but essentially these are products that are used in the manufacture of 

methamphetamine and amphetamines. These are products that are 

very dangerous, they are dangerous not just in their substance and 

8

how they are handled, but they are dangerous in how they are 

used. 

I think that what we are going to learn today is that not only 

are these products available, but how we deal with them and how 

we go about changing the law and giving law enforcement those effective resources that they need. 

So why are we here? Why are the children that are before us, 

these students here? They are here because we have asked them 

to be here and I want to thank each and every one of them, because I think that they should come to recognize and know that 

there are people who are adults and who are elected officials and 

who work for our government that care very deeply about their 

success. I want them to know that they should have the faith in 

our commitment to rid our country of drugs and to make sure that 

when they are parents, they do not have to go through the problems of worrying about what their kids are doing and the availability of drugs on our streets. 

Last, Mr. Chairman, what I would like to do is that I would like 

to announce that I am going to be going back to Washington, DC, 

and will be introducing a bill. And what this bill is to do is to talk 

about how we need to deal more effectively with the problems of 

methamphetamine. Little did I know that today there was an article that was in the Austin American Statesman, and what this article talks about is it says, ‘‘Missouri becomes a methamphetamine 

capital.’’ Now this is in a paper that is in Austin, TX. But those 

are the same headlines that we have had in Dallas, TX and across 

north Texas for many years, because we have been the focus of not 

only organized drug rings, but also what we call mom and pop 

shops, people who set up drug or methamphetamine houses. 

What we are going to do in this effort that I am announcing is 

that we are going to say that anyone who is involved in the manufacture, distribution and sale of methamphetamine would be given 

life in prison without parole. Now many of you may think that that 

is rather stiff, a stiff sentence. But I think that if you look at, in 

the scheme of things, the drug problem that we as parents and as 

Congressmen, as your legislators, are looking at, we recognize that 

in 1994, there were over 700 methamphetamine related deaths in 

the United States—700 deaths. What we are dealing with is a 

product that is unsafe for any person, especially children. 

So what I am trying to do is to send a strong message that will 

be given to every single drug thug that is in this country. The merchants of death will not be able to hide from the DEA and law enforcement. When a person is arrested who is involved in methamphetamine, it will be the one time that law enforcement comes 

into contact with them. They will be held accountable in our judicial system and they will be put away for life. 

Many times in Washington, Congressman Souder and I sit 

through debates where we talk about other countries and how they 

deal with drugs. Well, we know what we are talking about is our 

drug problem here in the United States. So many times we do not 

understand why Colombia and Mexico do not effectively deal with 

the distribution, sale and manufacturing of drugs in their country. 

I think it is high time that we here in the United States recognize 

it is our problem too. 

9

I believe this legislation is not only very timely, but I feel like 

it will be effective and I feel like it is reasonable. I hope as we hear 

throughout the hearings today from testimony that will be given by 

professionals in law enforcement, you will see that Washington, 

DC, and in particular your Representative is not only hearing what 

is said, but I get it. What I get is that it is our children and our 

citizens that are at risk from these merchants of death and we are 

going to do something very effectively about that. 

Thank you so much, Mr. Souder. That is the end of my opening 

statement. 

[The prepared statement of Hon. Pete Sessions follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. I want to congratulate Congressman Sessions on 

his effort because one of the things that in fact is going to happen 

if we are successful in interdicting these drugs and eradicating the 

drugs in a lot of the source countries, what we indeed will face is 

methamphetamine in our own Nation. We already see this in a lot 

of our national forests and national parks, in any place there is 

open spaces like in north Texas and in Oklahoma, the Ozark area 

in Missouri, you’re going to see huge meth labs in addition to the 

mom and pop’s. So I think your bill is very timely. 

At this time, I would like to reintroduce our first guest and our 

sole guest on our first panel. Paul Coggins is the U.S. attorney for 

the northern district of Texas, he has been in his current position 

since 1993. Prior to that, he served as special assistant to the State 

of Texas attorney general. He also serves or has served previously 

on the mayor’s Task Force on Criminal Justice, the Coalition for 

a Safer Dallas, and Attorney General Janet Reno’s advisory committee. 

In accordance with House rules, we must swear you in because 

this is an oversight committee. If you will stand and raise your 

right hand. 

[Witness sworn.] 

Mr. SOUDER. Let the record show that the witness answered in 

the affirmative. Mr. Coggins, it is an honor to have you here and 

please proceed with your opening statement. 

STATEMENT OF PAUL E. COGGINS, U.S. ATTORNEY, 

NORTHERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS 

Mr. COGGINS. Before I do, I would like to thank you, Mr. Chairman, for coming to Dallas. I knew Congressman Sessions had great 

gifts of persuasion, but to persuade you to come to Dallas in July, 

he is even more silver-tongued than I thought he was. But we will 

hope to get you out of here without getting too hot. 

I do have a statement I would like to read. I will skip over the 

cases that I put in the written statement, except I think in light 

of Congressman Session’s opening statement, I might like to touch 

on a few of the meth cases that have been made in the northern 

district of Texas, to show you what a danger this meth can be and 

how devastating the consequences of meth can be. 

Mr. SOUDER. And if I may say, with unanimous consent, we will 

insert your whole written statement in the record and if you or any 

other witness has other materials, if you can get that to our committee, we will insert that as well. 

Mr. COGGINS. Thank you. 

I would also like to point out that Rose Romero, who heads our 

Narcotics Task Force in the U.S. attorney’s office planned to be 

here. She was taken ill with food poisoning last night and called 

this morning and apologizes, and I apologize on behalf of Ms. Romero. She would liked to have been here. 

With that, I will read the statement. 

Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee, I appreciate the 

opportunity to appear before you today to address drug trafficking 

prosecutions in the northern district of Texas. As the U.S. attorney 

for the northern district of Texas, I will address the northern disVerDate jul 14 2003 10:19 Dec 05, 2003 Jkt 010199 PO 00000 Frm 00017 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 W:\DISC\46528 46528
14

trict’s role in the enforcement of Federal laws in drug trafficking 

and related cases. 

As you know, the President’s National Drug Control Strategy 

outlines a collective American effort to achieve the common purpose of reducing illegal drug use and its consequences in America. 

The law enforcement community in the northern district of Texas 

is committed to this effort and has worked aggressively to that end. 

As part of the northern district of Texas, the Dallas/Forth Worth 

Metroplex ranks among the largest metropolitan areas in the Nation. During the past decade, the Metroplex has become a primary 

center for international commerce, telecommunications, high technology and finance. Due to its physical location, rapid growth and 

second busiest international airport in the world, Dallas/Fort 

Worth is one of the top ranking transportation hubs in the United 

States. 

These characteristics have served as a magnet to today’s most 

prominent international drug trafficking cartels. Since the Dallas/

Fort Worth Metroplex is a nexus to the border, the Mexican 

polydrug trafficking groups have always maintained a presence 

here. With their rise to prominence and their attempt to avoid enforcement efforts targeting the Southwest Border, however, the cartels are increasingly using the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex as a 

strategic transshipment center for distribution of illegal narcotics 

throughout the United States. A recent DEA investigation suggested the presence of several drug cartel command and control 

elements located in Dallas/Fort Worth. In addition, the Metroplex 

has emerged as a significant point of distribution, with large quantities of narcotics being distributed locally before transshipment to 

other parts of the United States. 

Since the mid-1980’s, Federal, State and local agencies have in 

the area consistently pooled resources through the Organized 

Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force—OCDETF in short—to address the increasing international and local drug trafficking threat 

in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex. And I would like to point out 

that OCDETF was begun under a Republican administration, it 

was continued under a Democratic administration. It has been perhaps the finest bipartisan effort in law enforcement that I am familiar with. 

Federal agencies on our OCDETF team include the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the 

Internal Revenue Service, the Immigration and Naturalization 

Service, the U.S. Customs Service, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco 

and Firearms and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service. The above 

agencies work closely with local police departments and district attorneys’ offices. In the northern district of Texas, Federal drug 

prosecutions are supervised by Deputy Criminal Chief Rose Romero 

and lead OCDETF attorney, St. Clair Theodore, both of the U.S. attorney’s office. 

Interagency cooperation has been fundamental to the many successful investigations and prosecutions of major drug trafficking organizations operating in the northern district, and it is the key to 

future success. The goal of the OCDETF program is to identify, investigate and prosecute members of high level drug trafficking and 

related enterprises and to dismantle the operations of those organiVerDate jul 14 2003 10:19 Dec 05, 2003 Jkt 010199 PO 00000 Frm 00018 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 W:\DISC\46528 46528
15

zations by: No. 1, supplementing Federal resources for the investigation and prosecution of major drug trafficking and related organizations; No. 2, fostering improved interagency coordination and 

cooperation in the investigation and prosecution of major drug trafficking and related cases; and, No. 3, working fully and effectively 

with State and local drug enforcement agencies. 

Pursuing this goal has resulted in numerous cases against highlevel drug traffickers, which in turn has had an appreciable impact 

on illegal drug trafficking. 

The OCDETF program is recognized throughout the country, and 

certainly in the northern district, as the successful model for Federal, State and local participation in significant narcotics and narcotics-related investigations and prosecutions. Such investigations 

are often complex and require a significant amount of resources 

and personnel. Many of the investigations use highly technical and 

complicated investigative tools, such as wiretaps. As a result, only 

the most experienced and seasoned trial attorneys are assigned to 

the OCDETF cases. Another significant aspect of the OCDETF concept is that attorneys are assigned to work with investigative 

agents at the earliest stages of the investigations. This ensures 

that sufficient admissible evidence is gathered to obtain the convictions of each and every identified member of large scale drug trafficking organizations. As a result of such teamwork, agents and attorneys working on OCDETF cases establish levels of trust and 

communications that carry beyond individual cases and enhance 

future working relationships. 

Another effective tool we use against high level drug traffickers 

is the money laundering statutes. The sums of U.S. currency connected to trafficking organizations is staggering. The Criminal Investigations Division of the Internal Revenue Service has played 

and continues to play a significant role in the prosecution of recent 

high-level, high-profile cases. For example, where the money trail 

led to the identification and ultimate conviction of several prolific 

marijuana traffickers. 

It is the philosophy of this district to attack drug trafficking organizations on all fronts. Therefore, the northern district is very active in the forfeiture of drug proceeds and the forfeiture of assets 

used by drug traffickers to further and facilitate drug trafficking 

crimes. Forfeitures are instrumental in combating the drug trafficking problem in that such forfeitures inhibit the ability of drug 

traffickers to continue their illegal activities. 

One of the most disturbing trends in the drug trafficking organizations that we have encountered recently is the increasing number of young individuals employed by highly sophisticated drug organizations. This is especially true in crack cocaine organizations. 

Current prosecutions involve several defendants between the ages 

of 20 and 25 and the drug organizations are recruiting teenagers. 

These young people undertake a variety of drug trafficking duties, 

including acting as managers and organizers for the drug trafficking organizations. The law enforcement community reports that 

younger drug traffickers are much more aggressive and violent in 

their trafficking activities. 

In order to continue effectively to investigate, prosecute and dismantle the drug organizations in our area, it is imperative that we 

16

continue the cooperative effort fostered by the OCDETF program. 

As a Federal/State/local partnership, OCDETF is beneficial to all. 

State and local resources, expertise and intelligence are considered 

invaluable to Federal drug investigations, especially in geographic 

areas where Federal resources are limited. Because OCDETF allows State and local officers to be deputized, these officers are empowered to participate as full partners with Federal agents and to 

pursue Title XXI violations across jurisdictional lines. In addition 

to law enforcement personnel, involvement of State prosecutors is 

also beneficial where State laws and local ordinances offer broader 

latitude. 

Since 1994, the Dallas Field Division of the Drug Enforcement 

Administration has seen a tremendous increase in the quantities of 

methamphetamine available for distribution on the streets of Dallas/Fort Worth. The DEA estimates an approximate 150 percent increase in the number of methamphetamine-related case initiations 

from 1994 to 1995—that is a 150 percent increase. The vast majority of these cases involved either methamphetamine or amphetamines. Much of the methamphetamine encountered in the DallasFort Worth area is transported from California, Arizona and Mexico. Recent intelligence attributes the increased trafficking of methamphetamine throughout the Southwest to the activities of international drug cartels. Identifying the command and control structures of these international drug trafficking organizations, targeting them effectively and dismantling them is a priority of drug 

enforcement agencies in the northern district of Texas. Such efforts 

are conducted jointly by Federal, State and local law enforcement 

agencies. 

The availability and price of cocaine remains stable throughout 

the northern district of Texas. Cocaine is readily available and is 

widely used in all populations and social groups with no indication 

of decline in availability or popularity. Drug enforcement agencies 

in the northern district of Texas are aggressively pursuing structured and highly sophisticated cocaine trafficking organizations. As 

illustrated in the case summaries below, the drug enforcement 

community in this District has successfully disrupted and dismantled several trafficking organizations that had become deeply entrenched throughout the northern district. However, the drug trafficking business is highly lucrative and quickly recruits replacements. 

Heroin availability in the northern district of Texas is on the 

rise. Quality is increasing and recent intelligence indicates that the 

Mexican border continues to increase in importance as a conduit 

into the United States. Over the last several years, law enforcement personnel involved in heroin enforcement activities have 

found that family based heroin trafficking organizations are using 

generations of intimate knowledge of the Texas/Mexican border to 

evade detection and interdiction. Mexican heroin, however, is not 

the only threat. As shown in the case summary below, importers 

of southeast Asia heroin are aggressively making in-roads in domestic markets. Smuggling and distribution are being directed by 

Nigerian and Vietnamese organizations. This heroin is often flown 

from Bangkok and Hong Kong to Mexico, where couriers bring it 

across the United States border. Once inside Texas, it is transVerDate jul 14 2003 10:19 Dec 05, 2003 Jkt 010199 PO 00000 Frm 00020 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 W:\DISC\46528 46528
17

shipped to East and West Coast cities, especially New York and 

Los Angeles. 

Crack cocaine is still a significant problem throughout the northern district from urban and rural areas. Drug enforcement investigations reveal that crack cocaine distribution organizations are 

highly sophisticated and organized. The market for crack has 

spread from the original lower income and primarily African-American users to include mid and higher income users and all ethic 

classes. 

Marijuana continues to be the most rampant drug in the northern district of Texas. Multi-pound to multi-ton seizures of marijuana continue to be commonplace. Tractor-trailers and privately 

owned automobiles continue to be the smuggling means of preference. Marijuana distribution organizations have become more 

complex and sophisticated. Groups often move marijuana through 

Dallas and store it in several stash houses before it is repackaged 

for further distribution to Ohio, Oklahoma, Florida, Michigan and 

other Northern States. 

I have set out a number of recent case summaries which will be 

added to the record, but I would like to, in those case summaries, 

given the focus on methamphetamine, to focus you on page 12 to 

a number—this is representative of the type of cases we are seeing 

in methamphetamine. The case involving United States v. Willis 

Bradford Allen, et al. 

On June 25, 1996, after a 3-year investigation by the Dallas office of the DEA, assisted by the Garland Police Department and 

other local law enforcement agencies, 23 defendants were indicted 

in connection with the Willis Allen organization. The investigation 

spanned 3 years, beginning in 1994, during which time the organization distributed from 5 to 10 pounds of methamphetamine in 

Texas, Oklahoma and Louisiana per week for a period of 2 years. 

Eighteen defendants have pled guilty, three are fugitives and two 

defendants are pending trial. Although no defendants have been 

sentenced today, the guideline range for the conspiracy count alone 

is 21 to 27 years. In addition to drugs and drug paraphernalia, numerous guns were seized from this organization. 

On September 25, 1996, John Groves was indicted following an 

investigation by the Dallas office of the DEA, which responded to 

a request for assistance from the Irving Police Department. Groves 

was the cook and property owner of a methamphetamine lab in Irving. His property and specifically the structure housing the lab, 

was immediately adjacent to the playground lot at Stephen F. Austin Junior High School. Groves pled guilty and is awaiting sentencing. The contents were so volatile in the cooking area of the lab 

that it was necessary to ventilate the area for hours before safely 

entering. Masks were worn by Groves in order to work in the lab. 

On September 25, 1996, 12 members of the Campos organization 

were indicted. The organization operated out of California, Dallas 

and Alabama. During the 3-year DEA investigation, beginning in 

1993, approximately 400 pounds of methamphetamine were seized. 

The leader of the organization was sentenced to 29 years, four sentences averaged from 4 to 8 years and the remaining defendants 

are awaiting sentencing. 

18

Those represent some of the kind of methamphetamine activity 

and cases and investigations we are seeing in the northern district 

of Texas. I would, however, like to point out one other case of note, 

because it is a heroin case. And I think it gives you an idea of the 

level of heroin importation we are seeing in the northern district 

at this time, and it is on page 15. 

United States versus Hamid Reza Sayadi—I am going to get you 

to pronounce that for me, Congressman Sessions—Takhtehkar. 

On April 11, 1997, Aziz Ghanbari of Istanbul, Turkey, was sentenced to life imprisonment in connection with his role in an international drug smuggling venture, which resulted in the importation of 98 kilograms of heroin in the United States at Lubbock, TX. 

Evidence at trial showed that the conspirators negotiated with undercover San Francisco DEA agents to transport large shipping 

containers to Romania, where the conspirators, in turn, would fill 

each shipping container with from 500 kilograms to a ton and a 

half of heroin base. This seizure is believed to be the largest domestic seizure of southwest Asian heroin in the history of the United 

States and the sixth largest domestic seizure of any type of heroin 

in the United States. Hamid Reza Sayadi-Takhtehkar of Vienna, 

Austria was also convicted and sentenced to 30 years imprisonment. Two additional defendants, Hakki Aksoy of Istanbul, Turkey 

and Sezgin Yildizhan of the Netherlands, were also convinced and 

received substantial prison sentences. 

In sum, between 1995 and the present, the Dallas Field Office 

of the DEA, working jointly with other law enforcement agencies, 

has conducted investigations that have led to arrests, indictments 

and convictions of more than 345 members of major drug organizations responsible for trafficking in over 129,000 pounds of marijuana, 4,375 kilograms of cocaine, 5,235 kilograms of crack, 700 

kilograms of heroin, 1,100 pounds of methamphetamine and 50 gallons of PCP. 

In conclusion, I want to thank you for the opportunity to appear 

at today’s hearing and for your support to law enforcement agencies in bringing to justice drug organizations. We recognize that enforcement of drug laws, though important, is not the sole answer 

to the plague of illegal drugs. We must explore ways to combine 

strong enforcement with equally strong strategies for prevention, 

demand reduction and treatment. 

Thank you for your time and your interest in this important 

issue. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Coggins follows:]

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35

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you very much. I yield to Congressman Sessions. 

Mr. SESSIONS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Coggins, I think you have exhibited today why you were 

talked about in Washington by not only our President, President 

Clinton, but also our Attorney General Janet Reno, as one of the 

bright young faces in law enforcement, and certainly as one of the 

finest U.S. attorneys in America. Thank you for your compelling 

testimony. 

I would like to, if I could, please direct some of my questions to 

you. You briefly spoke about the Dallas/Fort Worth area as being 

a hub of international trafficking. And in that testimony, you alluded to DFW—what we know as DFW Airport. I also know that 

there are some other airports that are around, I also know that 

much of this is proprietary to your business, but could you briefly 

discuss where it is coming from, how it is coming in here, the role 

of DFW in this international drug trafficking? 

Mr. COGGINS. Well, DFW, obviously—I guess you start with this, 

Congressman, and that is, wherever you have a large amount of legitimate trade, you have a danger of illegitimate trade trying to 

piggyback on that legitimate trade. Huge amounts of legitimate 

trade pass through DFW and the other airports. The DEA established a task force out at DFW Airport, which was a model for the 

task forces, and we were getting tremendous seizures of drugs. 

That task force has been so successful in many instances that we 

found many of the cartels were steering clear of the DFW Airport 

because the heat was so great. 

But it is like any other area—and they were bringing it up 

through other airports or, as I mentioned in some of this testimony, 

oftentimes in trucks. For example, a lot of the marijuana comes up 

in large trucks, comes up across the Mexican border in trucks. 

Drug enforcement is cyclical and we know that, we know we cannot let down our guard at any of the airports, because as soon as 

we do that, the word will go out that they can come back through 

the airports and what we will see is they will start testing it again. 

So I anticipate that we are going to always have this problem 

wherever we have huge amounts of legitimate trade, and that is, 

we are going to have illegitimate trade trying to sneak in at the 

same time the legitimate trade is coming through, whether it is by 

planes in airports, by trucks—we had a Nigerian ring in which 

women were used to body carry heroin into this country. So they 

are willing—the drug traffickers have proven they are willing to 

risk anybody’s life, anybody’s health, anybody’s safety because of 

the amount of money that is available in this. And Dallas, because 

it is close to the border, because it has a tremendous airport and 

because it has got access to both coasts, which is attractive to legitimate business, makes it equally attractive to illegitimate business. And we have got to keep our DFW Task Force honed, ready 

to go. We have got to do the same thing at the other major airports 

in the area as well. 

Mr. SESSIONS. I hear you suggesting rather clearly that because 

of the size of DFW Airport, because of the amount of cargo and 

traffic and passengers that comes through there, that this is the 

distribution channel obviously for these drug thugs and what they 

36

are doing is putting people through and you are simply having to 

take a lot of your time and resources to check all of these people. 

Mr. COGGINS. Right. 

Mr. SESSIONS. Where else is it popping up? Is it probably somewhere else, and because you are having to concentrate your efforts 

here, are they using other distribution channels? 

Mr. COGGINS. Oh, absolutely. You saw it from the case. The 

northern district of Texas is a huge district, and one of the points 

that the chairman made I think that is absolutely true, and that 

is that there is no drug that comes across the border that does not 

affect all of us in the area, and what happens is as more and more 

pressure is put on the border, they find alternate ways to try to get 

in. The 98 pounds of heroin that came into Lubbock, TX is a huge 

seizure of southwest Asian heroin and I think that was a response 

to the pressure put on the border, trying to find an alternate route 

into this country. Pressure put in DFW, they are going to try to 

get in through Lubbock or they are going to try to get in through 

some other airport out there. So it is a little bit like squeezing the 

balloon and that just shows you that we have to have multi-district 

cooperation. It is not a problem that can be addressed by any district by itself no matter how hard we work. 

One of the things I am excited about, Congressman, as you know, 

a lot of my testimony was about the OCDETF concept. I think the 

OCDETF concept is an outstanding concept because it leads to not 

only cooperation within the northern district of Texas, but also cooperation between the northern district of Texas and the southern 

district of Texas and the western district, New Mexico, Arizona and 

California. We are attempting to streamline the OCDETF program 

now and one of the areas that is going to be concentrated on is the 

Southwest Border, broadly construed to include Dallas/Fort Worth. 

So we are going to be linked up with Los Angeles, San Diego, Albuquerque, Phoenix, Houston, San Antonio and Dallas/Fort Worth 

will all be linked in one OCDETF region. We are going to have 

more access to their information, we are going to share information, we are going to share techniques, we are going to make it so 

hot on these drug organizations that they know they cannot, if 

things get too hot in the northern district of Texas, try to sneak 

through another district. 

Mr. SESSIONS. Interesting. So in other words, you would consider 

this creative process that you have established one that you would 

like to see broadened——

Mr. COGGINS. Absolutely. 

Mr. SESSIONS [continuing]. And become—and probably the area 

you described would be linear, that it would go across the States 

of Texas, all across Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, all the way to 

California, to encompass our border. 

Mr. COGGINS. Obviously, we have to share and we have to work 

with our colleagues in Oklahoma and States north as well, because 

there is a corridor straight up from the border, straight through 

Dallas/Fort Worth up to Oklahoma and States north too, for distribution. So what you find in Dallas is Dallas is just a very convenient place for people to transship goods and that is true for the 

drug organizations as well as anybody else, whether they are shipping them north, east or west, Dallas has become a major hub. 

37

Mr. SESSIONS. My last question to you, Mr. Coggins, is could you 

please discuss with me—we have seen drugs around since—I am 

42, you are probably about that same age, when I was in high 

school in the early 1970’s, drugs were available. We do not seem 

to have put the stop to these. 

Please talk to me a minute about how these drugs are aimed at 

children and how destructive they are, if you could. 

Mr. COGGINS. Well, one of the things I touched upon is not just—

drugs have always been aimed at children. They are always aimed 

at the most vulnerable people in society they can aim these at. 

Children have always been a primary target, and that is one of the 

reasons you see, for instance, people setting up near playgrounds, 

people hoping to induce the youngest and most vulnerable people 

in our society to get off on the wrong track, to throw their lives 

away because oftentimes children do not have that long view. As 

far as they are concerned, you know, the future is next week, if you 

go that far. Drugs prey upon that kind of attitude. 

I think perhaps the most shocking thing that I have seen—because I was an assistant U.S. attorney in the early 1980’s and we 

prosecuted drug crimes and I was in court a lot more then prosecuting the cases. We saw a certain level of defendant and, you 

know, our defendants were in their 20’s or 30’s. What is shocking 

now is that not only are drugs aimed at kids now, but kids are selling drugs to kids. The drug organizations, in their effort to evade 

punishment, are trying to recruit kids to push those drugs. So it 

is not uncommon for us now to have a cooperating individual sitting up in the stand on a trial describing the drug organization, describing who were the lookouts, who were the distributors, how 

much the drugs cost and that witness may be 15 years old. You 

have a kid selling drugs to kids. It has deteriorated that far and 

we have younger and younger defendants coming through the system getting their lives off track, and of course, a huge amount of 

deaths. One of the things I did not touch on here, we are talking 

about drug crimes here, but a lot of these drug organizations are 

directly responsible for homicides, dozens of homicides can often be 

laid at the feet of these drug organizations. They are willing to kill 

to protect the money they make. They are willing to kill our kids, 

they are willing to kill someone who gets in their way. 

One of the things I think you are going to see and you have seen 

already is how united the communities are behind getting these 

drug dealers out, because nobody, nobody suffers from the drug 

trade as much as a parent who is trying to raise a kid in perhaps 

public housing or public assisted housing, who has a drug gang 

take over that public housing, and no matter how hard those parents work, they know that for every 1 of them, there are 10 dealers 

hanging outside that complex trying to sell drugs to their kids and 

saying hey, I am the most successful guy you see because I have 

got the biggest car and the flashiest watch and all the rest of it. 

We literally have neighbors applauding the police departments, 

applauding the DEA for cracking down on these drug organizations, and moving them away from their kids. 

Mr. SESSIONS. Thank you, sir. Mr. Chairman, I am through with 

my questions. 

38

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you. I actually have what appears to be a 

minor victory in here I wanted to ask about. You said the availability and price of cocaine remains stable. In other words, you 

have not had an increase—what period of time is that? 

Mr. COGGINS. That is probably the last couple of years. 

Mr. SOUDER. Is the price down from where it was——

Mr. COGGINS. You probably need to check with the DEA, they 

keep the street prices for us. 

Mr. SOUDER. In most of the country, we have had an increase in 

supply and decrease in price. 

Mr. COGGINS. Right. There has been some decrease in price of 

drugs over time, but this is fairly short term. 

Mr. SOUDER. But to some degree, the more you interdict and the 

more pressure you put on, one of the things which has happened 

in Peru, which is one of these good news/bad news stories, is that 

the good news is that as we have put the pressure on there, increasingly now farmers are actually coming to United States aid 

and U.N. forces, U.N. representatives, and saying what else can we 

plant, because they are not paying us enough. Because we forced 

them down at that level. 

Mr. COGGINS. Uh-huh. 

Mr. SOUDER. As we up the interdiction price, also however, we 

are seeing larger domestic consumption in those countries because 

they cannot get as much out. 

I noticed one other—you had a case on page 13, you had nine defendants in the Diana Monsalve organization. What I thought was 

unusual about that, you do not usually see a female head. Is that 

something that you are seeing more of? You see females who are 

used by the Nigerians as transporters occasionally. 

Mr. COGGINS. That was probably not the head of that organization, it was probably the highest person we caught in that organization. So that would be rare to see—in fact, I was thinking back, 

I don’t remember a female actually being the top person in any of 

the drug organizations we indicted. I think we might have had 

some fugitives there and that is probably the highest level one we 

were able to apprehend. 

Mr. SOUDER. I think your heroin case, for anybody that does not 

think it is important that the agencies coordinate like you described you are doing so well down here, I mean you have got—

you start with a guy from Turkey with shipping containers from 

Romania of southeast Asian heroin. You also convicted a man from 

Vienna, Austria and from the Netherlands. 

Mr. COGGINS. I can say this, the German Government was chasing the same people that we were chasing, and the case—it turned 

into cooperation. The case could have been prosecuted in Lubbock, 

TX, in San Francisco, CA or possibly New York City, and it was 

decided that Lubbock had probably the best evidence to go on, so 

we went in Lubbock. We were happy to do it, but it requires sitting 

down and deciding—and the German Government wanted a piece 

of them too, but it was decided Lubbock had the best case. We were 

proud to have done that case, it was a major type case. I would also 

like to commend the DEA in Dallas, because they were the first 

folks, the Dallas Division of the DEA, to get Abrego Garcia indicted 

and Carillo-Fuentes indicted as well, they were indicted first in 

39

Dallas, then indicted in other places, and once they have two or 

three indictments against them, it is down to law enforcement deciding where the case can best be brought. So they have made big 

level cases, but most of these cases are not of that grandiose a 

scheme, but they are important cases because they are organizations. And as you will notice, we will have 25, we will have—we 

had a recent case that had 38 defendants. 

We can do that in Federal court more easily than you can do it 

in State court. In fact, you really cannot do it in State court, it is 

not practical in Texas, so we are able to bring a case against 38 

defendants. Now, we are obviously hoping not all 38 go to trial 

against us, we are looking at getting plea bargains from a substantial number of them, but we are aggressive. It does not do us any 

good to take one out, we are trying to take out the whole organization, if we can, from top to bottom. And then we will work with the 

State and the State will take some of those cases as well when we 

have an organization. 

One thing I did not point out here that I would like to commend, 

and that is that in Dallas/Fort Worth, our major metropolitan 

areas, we get a certain view of what a big case is in Dallas. A big 

case in Dallas would be, you know, a large scale drug organization. 

But in some smaller towns in the northern district, their idea of 

what is a big case—and a case that may be plaguing their area, 

would not be considered a big case in Dallas, but it is a big case 

to them. 

And it is still drugs, it is drugs aimed at their kids and they 

want those drug dealers off the street. DEA, and I am sure Julio 

will talk about this, has what they call the MET team, Mobile Enforcement Teams. We were able to put that MET concept into play 

in the Greenville area, brought a case in which we were able to indict 25. I believe by this point—we may have one fugitive, I believe 

all of them have either pled guilty or been found guilty at this 

point. And that drug organization had a major effect on Greenville. 

It might not have been considered a huge case by Dallas or L.A. 

or New York standards, but it was a huge case by their standards. 

We try to listen to those communities because the problem in 

drugs, as you gentlemen know, is not just in big cities, it is in all 

villages, communities, towns we have got in the country. 

Mr. SOUDER. I want to followup with that and mix another question with that. One of the things that we constantly hear is that 

if all these efforts are taking down all these people and we are having such success, how come all the drugs are still there and we are 

still having all the problems. My ultimate question here is do you 

feel that you have had an impact on what would have happened 

had you not done these. One of the things we heard in Colombia, 

as we have taken down the major cartels there and changed it, it 

is easier to track the others partly because they are less efficient, 

less skilled and to some degree make more mistakes. In combining 

that with the question on your task force, as I know when I worked 

for Senator Coates a number of years ago, an interesting dilemma 

always occurs as to how far up the ladder you go, because often 

while you are going up the ladder, they are still selling the drugs 

to the kids and so people, particularly farther down the cycle, are 

40

not real happy campers as you move up. But if you do not get the 

larger organizations, then somebody just steps in to replace them. 

At what point do you make a tradeoff? My favorite example is 

a county attorney in Richmond, IN, Indianapolis, which is a larger 

metro area and then feeding into a larger case, they were working 

on somebody who it turned out was the key person in Richmond, 

ultimately the trigger was pulled by a county attorney outside that 

central Indiana jurisdiction because it was the biggest drug bust 

that had ever occurred in Wayne County, IN and he was very concerned that they were taking too long. On the other hand that 

spoiled the Indianapolis tracking and the national tracking, but the 

reaction over in this town was, hey, we have got this guy, they 

have been working on this several years and drugs were pouring 

into our schools. At least now it will move to another city. 

How do you deal with those kind of things? It is easy to talk 

about cooperation but when money and that problem occurs, prosecution, it is hard. 

Mr. COGGINS. It is difficult and you are right, it is always a balance as to when you move and when you take somebody out and 

when you continue gathering intelligence. I mean every once in 

awhile our hand will be forced, you know, we will hear that someone is going to whack somebody and we have got to move in and 

stop it at that point. But this is where OCDETF comes into play 

in its most beneficial form. And that is that we are not just sitting 

there, a bunch of Federal agencies deciding when we are going to 

take it, we are going to have the Dallas Police Department there, 

we are going to have the Tarrant County Police Department there, 

the Richardson folks are going to be there. We want the police departments to know that we are not there to take the best cases, 

to take all the good cases, but to make a reasoned determination 

among law enforcement as to where the cases ought to go and how 

long we ought to work to develop those cases. So that they are part 

of the planning of this whole thing. 

And I can tell you this, we meet on a regular basis, we meet once 

a month. We have had our differences of opinion, but in my 4 years 

as U.S. attorney, we have never been unable to work that out with 

a district attorney or with a chief of police, because their interest 

is the same as our interest and that is to do the maximum—make 

the maximum impact we can on the drug problem in our area, and 

we have always been able to work it out and like I said, farm out 

certain cases to the district attorneys who have been eager and 

willing to take them, handle the others federally, and my theory, 

quite frankly, is, you know, I have never had a fight with a DA 

over a case. If a DA ever says I want to take the case, I say more 

power to you, that is great, because about 95 percent of the cases 

brought in the country are brought by DAs. As you guys know, 

Federal enforcement is a small subset of that. We ought to only 

take those cases that it makes more sense, either because we can 

join more defendants, because of jurisdictional issues or because of 

more bang for the buck at the sentencing. 

But in terms of moving, I can imagine a situation where they 

would want to move before we wanted to move, but the bottom line 

is they are a separate sovereign and if they decide to do that, they 

can do that. What we do in OCDETF is we try to sit down at a 

41

table like this and work out our differences and we have had tremendous success in working out our differences here. And that’s a 

tribute really not only to the Federal agencies, but to the chiefs of 

police we have got here and the district attorneys we have got here, 

who have exactly the same interest we do, and that is maximum 

bang for the buck. 

Mr. SOUDER. I have one last question and that is also a difficult 

question to sort out here, but I kind of wanted to get your read on 

it. I think every law enforcement official in the country, regardless 

of where they are at in this wants to see more cooperation as we 

see not only that international example but in Indiana we are 

heavily hit with the transit things coming through here and 

Nogales, AZ and other places. And more and more that information 

is getting up on linkage networks and much more sharing, which 

sounds really good except when you see what is happening in Mexico where they have had incredible penetration and increasingly in 

the United States if that information is shared all over the country 

we are going to be subject and vulnerable to penetration as well. 

How do you balance or do you have any sage advice as we look 

at these national information connection systems to make sure that 

the information stays secure? 

Mr. COGGINS. Well, you know, obviously the FBI and the DEA 

have huge computer systems with a lot of information plugged in 

about international drug trafficking organizations. And I’m sure 

that is pretty closely held. We have to worry not so much, Congressman—I understand that we can always be penetrated, but 

there is—I do not know if you folks have had a chance to visit the 

El Paso Intelligence Center but if you have not had an opportunity 

to visit down there, I think it would be well worth your while to 

go down to EPIC and to see the kind of incredible intelligence 

setup they have there. 

One of the things that we worry about in law enforcement in the 

northern district, it impacts your question a little bit, and that is 

not even necessarily intentional divulging of information, but unintentional divulging of information. If you do not have the secure 

transmission channels that—some law enforcement agencies can 

afford them and some do not have them. So I think one of the 

things we have to do when we are involved in OCDETF investigation, is to try to make sure that the law enforcement agencies, 

whether they are Federal or State or local have secure channels for 

transmitting information, because if they do not—and we have had 

this happen, we have had cases where we were moving in with arrest and search warrants in a place and we will see the news 

trucks pull up ahead of the agents to get there, and they have obviously picked this up off some radio transmission that was not secure. So we have security concerns, and I think that is an area 

where we have got to—if we have a player on the team, if we have 

an agency on our team, we have got to make sure that agency understands how important it is to keep these things secret, because 

lives are at stake, not just cases, but lives are at stake if it is not—

and No. 2, that they have got the equipment. 

All our OCDETF agencies, all our OCDETF workers have background checks that they go through and we are very blessed to 

have tremendously qualified law enforcement agencies, so I am 

42

more worried about the unintentional than the intentional right 

now, but I do agree with you that we are going to have to worry 

more and more about the intentional, because as I said, the drug 

trafficking cartels will stop at nothing. If they will kill people to 

practice their trade, they will sure as heck bribe or try to obtain 

confidential information. All I can tell you is that the way we have 

got to do that is to make sure that every player on the team goes 

through an extensive background check, understands the importance of keeping whatever information we have and we share confidential and making sure they have the equipment that will keep 

it so. 

Mr. SOUDER. Do you have any additional questions? 

Mr. SESSIONS. I do not, Mr. Chairman, except a comment and I 

want to just say thank you so much for taking time out of your day 

to be here for this important event. 

Mr. COGGINS. Thank you. 

Mr. SOUDER. I want to say the same and while a lot of people 

are critics that we have not solved the problem, there would be a 

lot more kids dead if you had not done the work that you have 

done and we appreciate that very much. 

Mr. COGGINS. Thank you. 

Mr. SOUDER. At this time, I would like to introduce our second 

panel, if you could come forward. Donnie Marshall serves as Chief 

of Operations for the Drug Enforcement Administration. Mr. Marshall is a native of Dallas and previously served in the DEA offices 

in Dallas, Houston and Austin. 

Julio Mercado is a Special Agent in Charge of the Dallas Field 

Division of the Drug Enforcement Administration. He is also a 

member of the Greater Dallas Crime Commission, Texas Police 

Chiefs Association and the Texas Narcotics Officers Association. 

I thank you both for being here today. Now that I have had you 

sit down, in accordance with House rules, will you stand, we must 

swear you in. Would you please raise your right hands. 

[Witnesses sworn.] 

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Marshall, go ahead with your statement. 

STATEMENTS OF DONNIE R. MARSHALL, CHIEF OF OPERATIONS, DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION; AND 

JULIO F. MERCADO, SPECIAL AGENT IN CHARGE, DALLAS 

DIVISIONAL OFFICE, DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION 

Mr. MARSHALL. Mr. Chairman, Congressman Sessions, thank 

you. I sincerely appreciate the opportunity to appear here today to 

address the drug trafficking problem in the Western Hemisphere 

as well as northeast Texas. I have submitted a complete written 

statement for the record and I will try in my comments this morning to briefly summarize that complete written statement. 

Before I proceed, I would like to thank the committee, you, Mr. 

Chairman, Mr. Sessions and the complete subcommittee for your 

support of the anti-drug program of the U.S. Government and specifically drug law enforcement and DEA. You have done a tremendous job in helping us do our jobs. 

My comments this morning will be an assessment of the threat 

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bia and the effect that they have on the United States. Although 

the Colombian traffickers still control cocaine production and much 

of the cocaine trafficking in the Western Hemisphere, the sophisticated and organized criminal groups in Mexico have really eclipsed 

the Colombian drug traffickers in recent years, especially in the 

Western and Southwestern United States. The leaders of these 

Mexican and Colombian groups are simply the 1990’s version of 

traditional organized crime syndicates that United States law enforcement agencies have fought since the turn of the century. These 

new groups, however, are far more sophisticated, ruthless, powerful 

and wealthy than the traditional organized crime families that we 

have combatted in the United States. 

Since the early 1970’s, drug traffickers from Colombia have been 

using the Caribbean corridor and routes through south Florida to 

smuggle massive quantities of cocaine and marijuana into the 

United States. With increased law enforcement pressure and presence in the Caribbean, south Florida and Colombia, the Colombian 

trafficking organizations were forced in recent years to turn to experienced Mexican drug smuggling organizations to move their 

products to American markets through Mexico and the Southwest 

Border of the United States. 

A few years ago, the Mexican transportation organizations 

changed the way that they charged the Colombian organizations 

for their services. They had previously been paid a set fee for 

smuggling a certain amount of narcotics through Mexico and into 

the United States and recently they began receiving payment for 

their services in the form of cocaine rather than cash. And by doing 

so, they vastly increased their profits, because they were able to set 

up their own distribution networks in the United States and profit 

more from selling the cocaine than from a flat fee for smuggling 

that cocaine. And with this increased wealth came the power to 

corrupt, intimidate, murder and bribe law enforcement and public 

officials on both sides of the border. The traffickers then adopted, 

the Mexican traffickers adopted the Colombian sales system which 

compartmentalized and insulated each function of their organization. 

The majority of the cocaine entering the United States continues 

to come from Colombia through Mexico and into the United States. 

In addition, the organizations from Mexico are responsible for producing and trafficking thousands of pounds of methamphetamine 

annually. Many of the leaders of these Mexican organizations are 

under indictment in the United States on numerous charges. I will 

spend just a few minutes to describe some of these major organizations for you. 

The first of these organizations is the Amado Carrillo-Fuentes organization. Until July 4 of this year, when he died following plastic 

surgery to hide his true identity, Amado Carrillo-Fuentes was the 

wealthiest and most powerful drug trafficker in Mexico and perhaps in the world. There appears to be no real clear heir apparent 

within the organization to replace Amado. His death will very likely create some degree of disruption, perhaps total chaos, we are 

hoping, in his organization, and among other traffickers battling 

for his turf. 

44

The Benjamin Arellano-Felix organization is headed by Benjamin 

Arellano-Felix and he operates in connection with his brothers. He 

is the head of a major trafficking organization that operates in Tijuana; Baja, CA and parts of the Mexican states of Sinaloa, Sonora 

and Jalisco. This organization is the most violent of the Mexican 

trafficking organizations and this organization was involved in the 

murder of Cardinal Posadas-Ocampo at the Guadalajara Airport in 

1993. The Arellano-Felix signature for violence is not only assassinating but torturing and dismembering their victims to send strong 

messages to others who may cross them. 

The Miguel Caro-Quintero organization is another very powerful 

organization and the focus of this organization is trafficking primarily in cocaine and marijuana. Miguel Caro-Quintero’s brother is 

currently jailed in Mexico for his role in the murder of DEA Special 

Agent Enrique Camarena in 1985. The organization, however, continues to operate and they continue to specialize in marijuana trafficking, cocaine trafficking and to some degree are involved in 

methamphetamine trafficking. 

The Jesus Amezcua-Contreras organization is based in Guadalajara. This organization is currently the world’s largest smuggler of 

ephedrine and the largest clandestine producer of methamphetamine in clandestine laboratories not only in Mexico but also in the 

United States. 

Joaquin Guzman-Loera began to make a name for himself in his 

drug trafficking career as an air and logistics expert for Miguel 

Felix-Gallardo, and although Joaquin is presently incarcerated in 

Mexico, his brother Arturo assumed leadership of this organization. 

This organization remains very active in Mexico, transporting cocaine from Colombia into Mexico, through Mexico, across the 

Southwest Border and into the United States, and they operate for 

the remnants of the Cali and Medellin cartels. This organization 

also smuggles Mexican marijuana and Mexican and southeast 

Asian heroin through Mexico into the United States. 

The violence that has long accompanied the drug trade is really 

evidenced now more than ever in Mexico, although it is not yet to 

the degree that was seen in Colombia in the mid and late 1980’s. 

The Arellano-Felix organization, which I briefly described is in fact 

considered the most violent and ruthless of the Mexican crime families and they maintain well-armed, well-trained security forces, 

which the Mexican authorities describe as para-military in nature 

and say that they’ve seen evidence that these security forces include international mercenaries as advisors, trainers and members. 

Drug violence, we have seen, is even spilling across the border 

into the United States, as these traffickers become more bold, brazen and violent in carrying out their mandate. The majority of the 

200 murders in Tijuana, Mexico last year are believed to have been 

drug related. There have been about 28 high profile drug-related 

assassinations in Mexico since 1993 and unfortunately many of 

these murders remain unsolved. 

At about this time last year, the violence along the United States 

and Mexico border exploded with increasing reports of American 

property owners under siege by armed traffickers. Fences were destroyed, livestock were butchered, random gunshots were fired into 

the homes of some ranchers who reported seeing armed traffickers 

45

from Mexico with night vision equipment and communication devices, protecting the movement of drugs into the United States. Increased law enforcement presence here in Texas along the Texas/

Mexico border, fortunately have resulted in a diminishing number 

of reports of this type of violence over the last year. 

During the last year also, instances of violence directed at U.S. 

law enforcement personnel have escalated along the Southwest 

Border. In April of this year, two inspectors from the United States 

Customs Service assigned to the Calexico Port of Entry were shot 

after directing a vehicle, which was loaded with marijuana, into a 

secondary inspection. At least three separate incidents in recent 

weeks, Border Patrol agents have reported receiving fire from Tijuana and on one occasion in May, a gunman from Mexico fired 

several rounds from the Mexican side of the border into the United 

States at the San Ysidro Port of Entry and the shot was fired into 

a United States Border Patrol vehicle, injuring the Border Patrol 

agent. So these are some of the examples of the violence that we 

are seeing spilling over into the United States. 

Drug violence also continues to escalate in Mexico, it threatens 

DEA agents there, it threatens their families and DEA efforts in 

Mexico. Threats against DEA and other United States officials 

have escalated in Mexico and along the border. Since September 

1996, DEA has documented six specific incidents involving threats 

against our own agents. 

Consequently, in September 1996, DEA established a Mexico 

Threat Assessment Working Group, which consists of all members 

of United States law enforcement at the Federal level, as well as 

intelligence community members. This group seeks to consolidate 

at a single point all information on potential threats against either 

United States nationals or host country nationals in Mexico and 

along the Southwest Border. Since its inception in September 1996, 

this group has dealt with over 40 threats against Mexican and 

United States law enforcement officials. 

DEA is seeing the emergence of new trends, distribution networks, methods of operation among the international players 

against whom we focus our investigations. The Mexican trafficking 

organizations now control illegal drug trafficking along the United 

States/Mexico border, the Western part of the United States and 

well into the Midwest part of the United States, especially as it relates to methamphetamine trafficking. For the first time, we are 

even seeing Mexican transportation groups delivering cocaine to 

Colombian and Dominican trafficking groups in New York City, a 

territory that was traditionally controlled solely by the Colombian 

trafficking groups. 

In order to protect and shield America’s Southwest Border, the 

DEA and FBI have launched into what we call the Southwest Border Initiative, which targets the leaders of the major Mexican trafficking groups that live in Mexico and control the heroin, cocaine, 

methamphetamine and marijuana trafficking on both sides of our 

common border. This strategy is designed to dismantle the criminal 

groups from Mexico by targeting their command and control functions and building cases against their United States-based infrastructure. This strategy combines the resources of DEA, FBI, the 

U.S. attorney’s office, the High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Area 

46

program or HIDTA, the OCDETF program, which Mr. Coggins has 

already described, the U.S. Customs Service and our many, many 

partners in State and local police departments along that Southwest Border. The effectiveness of this strategy is only hampered by 

the difficulty in incarcerating the leadership of these drug trafficking empires who hide in foreign safe havens like Colombia and 

Mexico. 

I know that the chairman of the subcommittee, Congressman 

Hastert, has an interest in the question of extradition from some 

of these countries. And from my own personal experience with Colombia in the mid-1980’s, I can tell you that one of the things that 

the traffickers most fear in these foreign countries is being returned to the United States and brought before the U.S. criminal 

justice system where they cannot buy their way out of conviction, 

where they cannot buy their way out of prison, where they cannot 

live in the lap of luxury in prison. And it is my belief that for the 

brief time that we were able to extradite major drug traffickers 

from Colombia in the 1980’s, it was that tool, in my opinion, that 

led to the beginning of the downfall of the Medellin and then the 

Cali cartels, and I believe that it started with the extradition of the 

most notorious criminal, Carlos Lader, who is still incarcerated, as 

a matter of fact, in a maximum security prison in Marion, IL. So 

this is a tremendous tool and I thank the chairman of the subcommittee for his interest in helping us get this tool back. 

Organized criminal groups, whether they are headquartered in 

Cali, Medellin, Sonora or whether they are home-grown versions 

that prey on people in Dallas, Oklahoma City and other United 

States communities, significantly affect the American way of life. 

These international traffickers have acted with impunity for many 

years and they believe that they are beyond the reach of U.S. law 

enforcement. The attacks on American law enforcement and citizens along our Southwest Border and in our cities and towns must 

continue to be met with coordinated investigative strategies that 

will hopefully ultimately lead to the demise of these organizations 

and their organized crime and its destructive influence in our communities across the United States. 

I would like now to turn to Mr. Mercado, Special Agent in 

Charge of DEA’s Dallas Division, who will discuss local trends and 

the steps that DEA is taking here in north Texas and Oklahoma 

to address the drug trafficking situation. 

Mr. MERCADO. Thank you, Donnie. Mr. Chairman, members of 

the subcommittee, I appreciate the opportunity to appear before 

you today to address the drug trafficking in northern Texas and 

Oklahoma. 

The criminal activities of the Colombian and Mexican criminal 

groups and their surrogates in the United States are affecting not 

only our Southwest Border areas but major American cities such 

as Dallas and Oklahoma City. 

Dallas is located at the junction of four major United States 

interstate highways, allowing easy access to Mexico and neighboring United States. This superior transportation offers many opportunities for the international drug traffickers from Colombia 

and Mexico, who have used the area to facilitate the movement of 

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west and into the Northeastern portion of the United States. Wherever these sophisticated organized crime groups spread their tentacles, violence follows. 

Colombian and Mexican criminals are allies in supplying cocaine 

to the Dallas region. Prior to the Mexican trafficking groups dominating the wholesale cocaine trade in the Western half of the 

United States, Dallas was being used as a transshipment point for 

South American cocaine. Mexican trafficking organizations would 

smuggle cocaine across the border and into Dallas, where it turned 

it over to traffickers from Cali, Colombia, for further distribution 

to the United States. 

As early as 1994, DEA seized 3,600 pounds of cocaine with over 

a ton of marijuana from warehouses being used to stage deliveries. 

During 1996, the DEA Dallas Division seized 250 kilograms of cocaine from Colombian traffickers shortly after it had been transferred to them from a Mexican trafficking group. Since the Mexican 

criminal families have come to dominate much of the wholesale cocaine market, they continue to use Dallas as the warehousing and 

transshipment location for their own cocaine shipment. 

Heroin abuse has sharply increased in many parts of the country 

and Dallas, after seeing a decline in 1994, is experiencing a steady 

increase in abuse, about a 24 percent increase in heroin-related 

emergency room episodes. Dallas has seen an 18 percent increase 

in drug overdose deaths attributable to heroin from 1994 to 1997. 

Mexican black tar heroin is the heroin of choice in the Dallas region, with deadly effects. 

Prices range from the $250–$300 at the retail gram level up to 

$80,000 to $175,000 per kilogram. Black tar heroin has hovered 

around 10 percent purity on the retail level in Dallas, among the 

lowest level of purity in the Nation, where average purity for generic heroin is around 40 percent. 

Methamphetamine. Within the last several years, the problem of 

methamphetamine production, trafficking and use has significantly 

increased. The methamphetamine problems had previously been 

isolated to places like California and some rural areas where outlaw motorcycle gangs had operated small labs and supplied small 

quantities of methamphetamine. However, during the last several 

years, drug trafficking from Mexico has taken over the meth trade 

and have expanded it significantly, increasing not only the supply 

of methamphetamine, but the violence associated with the trade. 

Clandestine labs operating in Mexico and in the United States 

under the control of powerful Mexican criminal groups are the primary source of methamphetamine rapidly invading our country. 

These groups are directly responsible for the hundreds of pounds 

of methamphetamine being sold monthly in the Dallas metropolitan area. Mexican groups typically establishing large clandestine 

labs to turn out 150 to 200 pounds of methamphetamine in a single 

48-hour production cycle, are operating on a much larger scale than 

the pure domestic mom and pop laboratories which produce from 

a few ounces to several pounds at a time. 

Tragically, once peaceful Midwest and Southwest communities 

are now absorbing the terrible brunt of the methamphetamine 

damage. 

48

Some of the Mexican groups involved in this drug trade are well 

known. The Amezecua-Contreras, the organization once run by the 

late Amado Carillo-Fuentes and the Arellano-Felix organization. 

The Amezecua organization is the most formidable of all the Mexican methamphetamine trafficking groups running super labs in 

Mexico and in California with ephedrine smuggled in from China 

and Europe. 

The Dallas Field Division has seized in excess of 111 meth- amphetamine labs in 1997, mostly in Oklahoma. These laboratories 

used two primary synthesis methods, the red phosphorous or the 

pseudoephedrine reduction method, commonly used by traffickers 

from Mexico. 

I made the same mistake. 

Mr. SESSIONS. I thought you did a great job. [Laughter.] 

Mr. MERCADO. Violence attendant to the drug trade. When many 

Americans express frustration about the problems of drug trafficking and violent crimes in their communities, they focus their attention on what is visible to them; the crack dealer on the corner, or 

the police officer murdered on the nightly news. They seldom associate these realities as an extension of organized crime group activity of the drug traffickers based on foreign soil. These international 

trafficking organizations employ thousands of surrogates in ideal 

transshipment cities like Dallas to distribute and sell drugs in 

American cities and towns. Many of these traffickers are gang 

members who have affiliated with national known and prominent 

street gangs such as the Bloods, the Crips and the Latin Kings. 

When street gangs serve as surrogates for foreign crime lords, actively distributing drugs on the street, drive-by shootings, murder, 

robbery and assault become commonplace. This level of drug-related violence, once limited to the inner cities and urban areas is now 

being experienced in the rural areas of Dallas and Oklahoma. 

DEA has addressed the relationship between drug trafficking 

and violent crimes through our Mobile Enforcement Team Program, which is called the MET. When invited by local police departments, the MET program sends in a team of investigators, specializing in the dismantling of violent drug gangs. 

There are now 19 teams located across the country which can be 

sent anywhere drug gangs are responsible for high crime rates and 

few crimes are being solved. 

The MET program, which was fully funded by Congress in fiscal 

year 1997, is based on the belief that those who distribute drugs 

on the streets of the United States and commit violent activities 

are part of a seamless international continuum of drug trafficking 

organizations headquartered in Colombia, Mexico and southeast 

Asia. The Dallas Division’s MET team was established in December, 1994, and has successfully completed seven deployments in 

Paris, Greenville, Tyler and Arlington, TX resulting in the arrest 

of 156 individuals and seizing significant amounts of methamphetamine and crack cocaine, as well as $216,324 in U.S. currency. 

Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, the current 

situation in the Dallas Division and other areas of the United 

States is serious and must continue to be addressed vigorously. 

We would like to thank you again for the opportunity to testify 

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standing of the drug trade in the United States and how it is impacted by the organized international criminals that control the 

vast majority of the trafficking networks that are based in Mexico, 

Colombia and the tentacles throughout the United States. In particular, we hope we have left you with an understanding of the 

drug situation in the Dallas Division. With your continued interest 

and support, we will combat this growing threat through joint investigations and efforts that will yield positive results. We will be 

happy at this time to answer any questions, sir. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Marshall and Mr. Mercado follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Would the gentleman like to go first? 

Mr. SESSIONS. Yes, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Sessions will start the questioning. 

Mr. SESSIONS. Thank you. 

Mr. Marshall, Mr. Mercado, thank you for being here today. I 

hope you know that Chairman Souder and myself care deeply, not 

only about the work that you do, but the people that you represent, 

because you are on the forefront of the problems and I know it 

comes at great risk to not only their lives, but also the interference 

that they would have with their families, but I hope that you know 

that we are deeply committed to providing you not only with the 

resources but also changing the laws as they interact, and offer you 

the ability to win this war on drugs. 

Having said that, I would like to read also a very important message that your Administrator—Administrator Constantine’s message from the Report on Methamphetamine Situation in the United 

States from just last year. In the first few paragraphs, he stated, 

taken from a case, ‘‘During the summer in New Mexico, a father, 

while high on methamphetamine, beheaded his 14-year-old son.’’

And in the same message, your Administrator described how a 

mother and three young children under 5 were seriously burned 

when a meth lab that was located in a trailer home adjacent to 

them burned. Two of the children were rushed to a hospital in critical condition and one died. The responsible father fled the scene, 

abandoning his critically injured family, before the rescue teams 

arrived to assist them. 

And from what I hear from each of you and from Mr. Coggins, 

the problem is getting worse. In several cities, methamphetaminerelated deaths are up over 50 percent in the last 3 years. In 1994, 

there were over 700 methamphetamine-related deaths in the 

United States. The number of emergency room drug abuse episodes 

involving methamphetamine have dramatically increased since 

1992. The number of methamphetamine-related episodes recorded 

during 1994 almost doubled the number of episodes from 1989. In 

1995, the Drug Enforcement Administration seized 241 methamphetamine labs. That is 1 year, 241 meth labs. Most of these occurred right here in the Western United States and many of them 

right in Texas. 

In 1994, the United States Customs Service inspectors seized 5.7 

metric tons of ephedrine, a key chemical used to produce methamphetamine designed and made in Mexico. 

The drug is poisonous and it is also available. After prolonged 

use, methamphetamine lead to binging, which is a consuming of 

the drug regularly for up to 3 days without any sleep. These binges 

can be followed by severe depression, worsening paranoia and aggression and a period known as tweaking. I am sure that each one 

of us have heard about people on cocaine and we are aware of the 

withdrawal that they go through, but this tweaking is very severe, 

because then a user collapses from exhaustion, waking up days 

later just to begin this cycle again. That is addictive, that is destructive, that is what is happening, not only to users but the children in this country. 

The new ephedrine-based methamphetamine is worse, however. 

It leads to sleepless binges that can last up to 15 days and that 

66

end in crashes that are far worse than just those from regular 

strength methamphetamine. Is that not amazing? We have 

strength, regular and extra-strength methamphetamine now. 

Now this drug is not unlike many others that we have in society. 

It is killing people, and I think it is time that this be stopped. 

Today, if you are caught with 10 or more grams of methamphetamine, you are considered to have manufactured or possessed with 

the intent to distribute methamphetamine, and there is a mandatory minimum sentence of not less than 5 years and not more than 

40 years in a Federal penitentiary. If death or serious bodily harm, 

injury, results from this sale of methamphetamine, the killer could 

get not less than 20 years and certainly not more than life in prison. 

If you are caught with 100 or more grams of methamphetamine 

and you are considered to have manufactured or possessed with the 

intent to distribute methamphetamine, there is a mandatory minimum sentence of not less than 10 years and no more than life in 

prison. If death or serious bodily injury results from the sale of 

more than 100 grams of methamphetamine, the killer would not 

get less than 20 years and no more than life. 

I would suggest to you as well as our chairman, Congressman 

Souder, that this simply is unacceptable. Anyone, I believe, who 

manufactures methamphetamine who knows that the effects of this 

drug is to kill people, then they in fact themselves are killers, and 

if the penalties for manufacturing this drug in the United States 

are no more than those for importing it from Mexico, then there is 

no disincentive to the drug thugs here in America. 

I, as I stated earlier, am going to propose that we go back and 

amend Title XXI of the U.S. Code and require for anyone caught 

in any way involved in the manufacture of methamphetamine in 

the United States will receive a mandatory life sentence in the 

Federal penitentiary. I will be working not only with my staff but 

other Congressmen and Senators on the Hill to make sure that 

America is not a safe haven for merchants of death, and I am talking about drug thugs. 

I hope that you see very clearly that not only do Americans and 

members of law enforcement have our attention, but that also 

Members of Congress, no matter what party they were in, can recognize how serious of an offense this is. We intend to do something 

about that. 

With this statement, I would also like to ask a few questions, if 

I can, of each of you. 

As you talked about this importation of drugs, are you finding 

that there are people who specialize in their products, or do they 

piggyback their multiple products on each other in that they will 

become a distribution channel for methamphetamine, for heroin, 

for cocaine? What are you finding? 

Mr. MARSHALL. I think, in my opinion, we see that the Colombian organizations are mostly concentrating on cocaine, I mean at 

the present time at least, that is their primary source of revenue, 

that is their primary focus. However, they have always—many of 

these groups have always been involved in smuggling marijuana as 

well. A more recent trend that we see is that Colombian traffickers 

are involved in the growth of opium poppies in Colombia and the 

67

production of heroin in Colombia, and what we see in that regard 

is that the Colombian trafficking groups are actually using their cocaine distribution networks to promote the distribution of heroin. 

We have even seen some cases where they would introduce heroin 

into markets by attaching a condition to the sale of cocaine. We 

will sell you 100 kilos of cocaine, but you must also take this 5 

kilos of heroin and move it. And what we see now is that the Colombians are moving more and more into controlling the heroin distribution networks primarily on the East Coast, but also they are 

moving into markets like Dallas, TX. 

With regard to the Mexican groups, we see that each group has 

generally a particular specialty or two, such as the Amado Carillo 

specialized primarily in cocaine and marijuana. But we have for 

several years now referred to these organizations as polydrug trafficking groups and we are seeing more and more and more that the 

Mexican organizations take advantage of their already long, well 

established distribution networks in primarily marijuana and heroin, which is their traditional drugs, but they use those networks 

to further their distribution of all four of the drugs—heroin, marijuana, methamphetamine and cocaine. 

So it is a combination that we are seeing. 

Mr. SESSIONS. When we talked about, and Mr. Coggins talked 

about, DFW Airport and the transportation channels, distribution 

channels that were used of the airlines and cargo holds and things 

like this, for big shipments, is that generally someone who is inside 

in the airline, who is aware of this, or how do you find that this 

actually occurs? 

Mr. MERCADO. We have found it both ways. When I was stationed in San Juan, Puerto Rico, we found out that the employees 

were the ones who were assisting the traffickers in transporting 

their drugs through cargo shipments, and through airlines, especially on the weekends when there is less security. We are seeing 

now in the last 6 months, I think we have seized 5 kilos of heroin 

coming from Colombia into the Dallas/Fort Worth area. So we are 

seeing that. 

Now, we are going to be targeting a lot more the cargo shipment, 

which is something we were not doing, and we are doing that now. 

Our group is being expanded to include the cargo area at DFW. 

Mr. SESSIONS. Outside of this what I would call commercial air, 

can you give me a sense without revealing the numbers, a sense 

of what flights are coming into our country every day through private aircraft, perhaps those owned by drug distribution people? 

Evidently like over Big Bend, you are seeing this as a continuous 

flow or operation that they utilize. 

Mr. MARSHALL. Let me comment on that from a national perspective. One of the other earlier witnesses, I believe it was Mr. 

Coggins, said that these things tend to run in cycles, the traffickers 

will use one method and then we catch up to that method and put 

pressure and the balloon squeezes out somewhere else. And this is 

particularly true with regard to your question about aircraft. 

What we have seen frankly in the last few years, couple of years, 

I would say, along the Southwest Border is really somewhat of a 

decline in the use of private aircraft, smaller aircraft. Now you still 

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ing cocaine, heroin, that sort of stuff. But the predominant method 

along the Southwest Border right now is smaller shipments in private automobiles and hidden compartments in trucks. That is the 

general national trend that we are seeing. 

Now I would have to ask Mr. Mercado to comment on the commercial airline aspect of that through Dallas/Fort Worth. 

Mr. MERCADO. We are working on it, sir, we are trying to identify the major points we can attack to prevent it from going in. At 

the present moment, Dallas is I think a security point three, which 

is you have to show identification, they can check your bags. So you 

are not going to see the same amount of drugs going through here 

that we saw body carrying, say 2 years ago. You might see it more 

in cargo than you will see it because of the security measures that 

are being handled at the various airports. 

Mr. SESSIONS. Would you comment then on any particular area 

or anything in dealing with the law—I am not asking you to write 

a bill, I am not asking for you to lobby, I am asking for you to comment on existing law, as you are dealing with not methamphetamine particularly, but rather things coming into the country; is 

there any particular area that you think the chairman and I should 

take back to Washington, an area that we should look at that 

would give you a greater ability to fight drug traffickers and them 

bringing things into the country. 

Mr. MARSHALL. There is one area, Congressman, which is of particular interest to law enforcement, and that is in the area of our 

ability to legally intercept the communications of the drug traffickers. We, at the Federal level, DEA, FBI, in conjunction with our 

State and local counterparts, in a partnership, we try to attack the 

traffic at all levels, this incudes the retail distributors that are 

doing the violence, it includes the wholesalers and the command 

and control structures. One of our biggest and most important tools 

in attacking the command and control structures of these organizations is our ability to intercept their communications. The traffickers themselves are becoming much more sophisticated in the 

way they communicate with each other and it is making our job 

more difficult. 

There are two issues, one being the Communications Assistance 

to Law Enforcement Act or CALEA, which will enable—with digital 

telephony and fiber optics and that stuff, it will more effectively enable the local communications companies to cooperate with law enforcement. There is a price tag to it and we need to, in my opinion, 

ensure that we have that tool so that the private companies do 

have the resources that they need to cooperate with law enforcement. 

The other aspect of this is the issue of encryption. There is a lot 

of people, not only drug traffickers, but business people who are interested in maintaining trade secrets, that sort of stuff, who want 

more in the way of encryption and the ability to use cellular telephones, for instance, and be assured of their privacy, and certainly 

that is a valid, legitimate consideration and it should be—the ability should be there. However, if we do not build in some type of 

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cept the conversations of these vicious criminal organizations, then 

we are going to lose a very important tool. 

I think these are two areas which are being discussed and debated in Congress right now and I just cannot over-emphasize the 

importance of those things to law enforcement. 

And I suppose the other item that I would focus on would be—

I agree with you, Congressman, that we do need stiffer penalties 

in the area of methamphetamine. I look at what some of the stories, and you referred to a couple of those out of our methamphetamine national strategy report, but I was at that conference and 

in addition to the two examples that you gave, I heard a lot of 

other horror stories, absolute horror stories about this drug. It is 

just astonishing, it is amazing to me to see the amount of violence 

that is associated with this drug, the amount of spousal abuse, the 

amount of child abuse, the amount of child neglect, just basically 

the amount of violence and death that is associated with this drug. 

And I think that this drug right now, at this point in our history, 

does warrant some special consideration. So I think that could be 

a very valuable tool. 

Mr. SESSIONS. Thank you. Your comments only help me to know 

that I believe that we must fight and win this war in America. We 

cannot look to someone else to solve our problem and so I take your 

comments very seriously and I thank you. Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SOUDER. Could you explain a couple of the nuances of this 

encryption debate and that is, you said it would require legal authority to crack the code and so on. I am sure people hear the telephone and some of that, and that sounds pretty important when 

you start to get into Internet, you realize we are really headed into 

a worldwide type of question here. Also I am sure part of the resistance is a general fear that—quite frankly, I do not have a ton of 

sympathy for people who are violating any kind of law, but including IRS information and other types of things or potential allegations that you might overhear and assume something is happening. 

When you can break through a code and you are searching for information on the drug issue, what about if you hear information 

that is suspicious related to other potential crimes, not necessarily 

that they are, but do you have to report that? How is that done? 

Mr. MARSHALL. Well, there are a rigid set of guidelines that govern our ability—that govern what types of conversation we listen 

to and what types we cannot listen to. And what we do, when we 

conduct a legal wiretap, obviously we go before a competent judicial 

authority, we obtain a warrant for that communication and we 

have meetings and we have only certain people who are authorized 

to listen to that wire and we also have what we refer to as a minimization rule which allows us to listen to any conversation just 

long enough to determine whether it is drug-related and germane 

directly to the things that we have outlined in the warrant for that 

intercept. And when we determine—if we determine that that conversation is not related to what we have a warrant to listen to, 

then we have to minimize our listening to that conversation, basically shut it off at that point. 

Mr. SOUDER. And you can do that on the telephone, why would 

not, if we do not have that ability to do it in e-mail and computer 

70

type things, why would the traffickers not go to that and how 

would you sort similar conversations? 

Mr. MARSHALL. It is conceivable that they would go to that, Congressman. And not being an expert or even fully literate with regard to Internet matters, I really—unfortunately, I am sorry, I cannot adequately comment on that. But I know that that is a concern 

of many in our business, that the next channel of communication 

may well be the Internet. 

Mr. SOUDER. It is something we ought to discuss, because if we 

get it shut off early on that we are not allowed to interfere—I noticed, because that was my immediate first reaction of how does 

this affect law enforcement if we—it is tough to balance individual 

rights, particularly when you do not necessarily have the technology to do it in the way that you said. I was curious too, I had 

not seen—this has been interesting today because Turkey was 

something back in the French Connection and all of a sudden it is 

the Lubbock Connection with Turkey, but I also saw in your testimony you mentioned India as being involved, abusing citizens, 

ephedrine contacts in Thailand and India. Do you see that very 

often or was that——

Mr. MARSHALL. Well, we do, yes. We see ephedrine coming to the 

illegitimate market from—it is produced in Europe, it is produced 

in China, I believe it is produced in India, and we see the drug 

traffickers aggressively going after sources of ephedrine and 

pseudoephedrine and in all of those places, what we see is that 

they make purchases on that international market and it is 

shipped to countries such as Mexico, Guatemala, perhaps other 

countries and then it is eventually gotten into Mexico where it is 

used in methamphetamine labs either in Mexico or in many, many 

cases is smuggled across the border, just as drugs would be and 

then utilized in the United States in the methamphetamine laboratories. 

Mr. SOUDER. Could you expand a little bit on ephedrine, is it not 

what is in aspirin and other types of legal drugs and at what point 

does it become a controlled substance and illegal and is that not 

part of our difficulty, is the volume and is that not partly why like 

marijuana there is this myth that these things are not dangerous 

when in fact they are much more dangerous than they used to be, 

depending on the mix. 

Mr. MARSHALL. Right. Well, you actually have two substances 

that are of concern to us. The first is ephedrine and that is produced primarily in China from the ephedra plant, it is a natural 

substance, and it was used predominantly in methamphetamine 

production up until several years ago when it was controlled under 

the—I forget the name of the act, but several years ago it was controlled. Now once it was controlled, it became more difficult to get 

in the United States and traffickers started moving to the 

pseudoephedrine method. And that has not been controlled. 

The ability for the traffickers to use pseudoephedrine is certainly 

to some degree dependent upon the easy availability of that in 

cough and cold remedies and it is used in such things as allergy 

medicines, cold medicines, cough and flu medicines and that sort 

of stuff. If you go into a pharmacy and look on the cough and cold 

rack, you are going to find 20 or 30 or 40 different brands lined 

71

up on that shelf and if you pick them up and examine them, you 

are going to see that many, many, if not virtually all, contain some 

amount of pseudoephedrine. 

Now the pseudoephedrine has been controlled, by the way, it was 

controlled in the Conference on Methamphetamine Control Act 

which was passed last October I believe and the controls take effect 

this October. And what that will do is control primarily the bulk 

sale of these tablets that contain pseudoephedrine. 

What we had seen was the mom and pop laboratories that are 

the ones that primarily remain in the United States, they would 

send a few people around say to 20 drug stores in Dallas, TX or 

any other community in the United States and they would literally 

buy up cases of this stuff. If they could, they would go back to the 

pharmacy and say I want a case of Sudafed or I want three cases 

of Sudafed. It is that type of purchase that we are trying to limit. 

Now that will not totally eliminate the methamphetamine market, 

but it will have an impact on the mom and pop laboratories, and 

it was also in the spirit of controlling that type of operation that 

Wal-Mart and later a couple of other companies entered into a 

partnership with DEA, and they have taken measures to make 

that—those drugs a bit more difficult for the traffickers to get, but 

at the same time, without impacting upon their availability to the 

general public. And basically the way we do that is that the sale 

of a certain quantity, and I believe it is something like a 60-day 

supply, is uncontrolled. If you exceed that amount for a single purchase, then at that point, it becomes a controlled transaction and 

there are certain recordkeeping things that have to be done on 

that. 

Mr. SOUDER. Are these drugs predominantly, like marijuana and 

crack, targeted at younger people? I noticed, Mr. Mercado, one of 

the labs here in this area was next to a school. 

Mr. MERCADO. That is correct, sir. They are looking for high 

school students, they will even go to junior high school because we 

know they are affecting colleges, they go as low as junior high 

school and even in some places grammar school. 

Mr. SOUDER. Is it like an initial gateway drug? Often do they try 

to move them to harder substances then? 

Mr. MERCADO. It is like marijuana where you give it to them 

once—once you get them hooked on it, they will continue, but it is 

more dangerous than marijuana. And every arrest we have made 

so far, every lab, the last lab we took off in Oklahoma, there was 

in excess of 11 weapons. So these people are violent. There are a 

lot of weapons. 

Mr. SOUDER. Could you give me, as a Yankee, a little bit of an 

idea here on how Dallas/Fort Worth fits into the rest of Texas. I 

think we have had the people from Eagle Pass, I think it is, on the 

border, kind of been flooded, but how do Houston, San Antonio, 

Austin, some of the cities fit into a pattern? We talked about this 

airport being in international commerce. Could you give me some—

I mean does anything come up the ship canal from Galveston to 

Houston and what are some different ways? 

Mr. MERCADO. What we are looking at is, for example, marijuana, cocaine and heroin coming through El Paso and going to the 

northern part of Texas and it lays in this area and from this area 

72

it is distributed to various points and warehouses. We have numerous warehouses that are all over Dallas, where you can actually 

store this merchandise and then take it up in small amounts. Some 

of it stays here. I would say a good 25 percent stays here, the rest 

goes up to the major cities in the east and the west. 

Mr. SOUDER. So you are saying three-quarters moves out of here. 

Would San Antonio and Houston, for example, be substantially different, that three-quarters of the drugs would stay there and they 

are not as much of a warehousing center? 

Mr. MERCADO. Well it depends where you come, because for example, some of the drugs from Brownsville and McAllen, TX would 

probably be stored in Houston and from there distributed to other 

parts of the United States. So you have two different locations 

where the drugs can be stored and sent to other parts of the United 

States. 

Mr. SOUDER. What would you say is the most important thing we 

could do related to this region in Washington in addition to the 

methamphetamine legislation? 

Mr. MERCADO. Well, as Mr. Marshall stated, we need to attack 

the communications of these organizations, we really do. That 

takes manpower, that takes money. And we need more manpower, 

we need more money to—we have to hire people to do a lot of our 

translations, a lot of our monitoring of Title IIIs, because we just 

do not have the resources. Normally, right now we probably have 

seven in our area and the resources are just—manpower, it really 

makes us short of manpower, so we have to go out and get—hire 

people to help us or work with—the locals are always helping us 

but still and all, it is very expensive and you need a lot of manpower. And that is the only way—we have to attack them that way 

because they have to communicate. To move their drugs, they have 

to communicate. 

Mr. SOUDER. Have you had—clearly we have had tremendous 

problems, vis-a-vis Mexico and the trust factor, have you had much 

interrelationship there, particularly with these kinds of warehouse 

shipments, any cooperation on tipping—I mean, unless you get 

sources who are going to tip you off, it is impossible to find what 

machine tool box something is in. 

Mr. MERCADO. There is a lot of sharing of information throughout the United States now between the Federal, the State and the 

local authorities. 

Mr. SOUDER. What about with Mexico? 

Mr. MERCADO. Mexico, there is some information coming out of 

our offices in Mexico. 

Mr. MARSHALL. Let me comment on that a bit if I may, Congressman, we have a contingent of I believe it is 39 special agents in 

Mexico in five or six different offices, and we do, to the extent possible, work with the Mexican authorities there. We are there in an 

overt capacity, we have no actual law enforcement authority there, 

so all of our ability to operate in Mexico derives—and in any other 

foreign country, for that matter—derives from our relations with 

the law enforcement officials of those countries. There, as you 

know, has been a very vast and public debate about Mexico during 

the certification process and I would simply say that DEA and the 

FBI continue to cooperate with Mexican law enforcement, to the exVerDate jul 14 2003 10:19 Dec 05, 2003 Jkt 010199 PO 00000 Frm 00076 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6602 W:\DISC\46528 46528
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tent that we can and to the extent that they have the capabilities 

to assist. And we believe that that situation there is showing signs 

of improving and we are hopeful that we will have even more capabilities in the not too distant future in that regard. 

Mr. SOUDER. Has DEA put any agents back into Tijuana or were 

they all pulled out of that State? 

Mr. MARSHALL. With regard to the bilateral task force operation 

in Tijuana, we have not yet returned our agents to that operation, 

nor have we returned them to the Juarez operation. The reason for 

that, quite simply, is that we have a security issue with our agents 

going across because of the violence, because of the assassinations, 

because of the threats that we have received, and because of the 

lack of—what we believe at least, the lack of physical security for 

our agents. We are currently discussing those issues with the Mexican Government and at some point in the not too distant future, 

I hope that we can get those issues resolved so that we can once 

again begin working in those bilateral task forces. What we are 

doing in the interim, however, is we are continuing to try to work 

to the maximum extent possible that we can with our 39 in-country 

agents to fill in the gap, so to speak, the void, so to speak, until 

we can get this issue resolved. 

Mr. SOUDER. I certainly hope so, I know President Zedillo seems 

very committed, but it is disturbing to come as somebody who is 

from the inner part of the country and hear that the trucks are 

bringing the drugs in, that there is a warehousing type of thing 

and yet we cannot even have DEA along critical parts of our border 

because they are not safe. We see about the reporter who was shot 

the other week, who was investigating, and it is a disturbing trend 

to all of us because it is our kids and our families and our communities that are at stake in this. But I do not think it is necessarily 

certain parts of the top but at the very top of the government, but 

we have to get ahold of this because, I mean, I see the increased 

trucking pressure and have looked at the border points and I have 

grave concerns about how it is going to be possible to control that, 

even if we control the airspace. 

I have no further questions. Do you have any more questions? 

Mr. SESSIONS. I just hope that we are successful to go find bigger 

fish, like Mr. Fuentes was. I encourage them all to go in and get 

all the facial changes that they want and let them die on the table. 

I appreciate and respect you for the job that you do. Best of luck 

and thank you so much for your time to be with us today and have 

a successful week. Thank you. 

Mr. SOUDER. Thank you very much. 

At this time, I would like to introduce our final witness, if Mr. 

Yarbrough would come forward. 

Kenneth Yarbrough is the Chief of Police for the city of Richardson, TX. Chief Yarbrough is a member of the Governor’s Task 

Force on Juvenile Crime, the Texas Municipal League’s Committee 

on Public Safety and the immediate past president of the Texas Police Association. He is also past president of the Texas Police 

Chiefs’ Association. 

Chief Yarbrough, we thank you for being here today and I need 

to swear you in. 

[Witness sworn.] 

74

Mr. SOUDER. Let the record show that the witness answered in 

the affirmative. My understanding is that rather than read your 

statement you wanted to go straight to some questions. Do you 

want to make any introductory comments? We will certainly put 

your whole statement in the record. 

STATEMENT OF KENNETH R. YARBROUGH, CHIEF OF POLICE, 

CITY OF RICHARDSON, TX 

Mr. YARBROUGH. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, members 

of the committee. I would just like to touch on a few areas that I 

think are the critical areas concerning local law enforcement. 

Local law enforcement obviously has a different perspective in 

the fight against drugs than our Federal agencies do. When a person picks up the phone and calls 911, he gets the local police agency, not a Federal law enforcement agency. 

People in this country are concerned at two points—the point 

where the drug dealer is invading their peace and tranquility in 

their neighborhood or the effect of the user who is committing 

other crimes against them to finance his drug addiction. Most people are not very concerned in this country about transportation, 

manufacturing, importation kinds of issues. We all operate on our 

self-interest and our self-interest is when in my neighborhood I 

cannot walk the streets feeling safe, when an apartment complex, 

an apartment in that complex is high traffic drug users purchasing 

their illegal drugs. These are the kinds of things that drive me, as 

a normal citizen, to have a fear, the fear that we know also exists 

from all the burglaries, robberies, thefts that are being perpetrated 

upon our law abiding citizens to finance their drug addiction. 

It has always been an interesting concept for most of us in local 

law enforcement that so few in this world can affect so many, when 

you look at the 10 individuals and their ‘‘families’’ in Mexico and 

a near same number in Colombia are capable of affecting so many 

people in this country. DEA must continue its effort on the foreign 

soil to alter and affect the behavior there. I doubt the success is 

going to be very great until this country accepts some major foreign 

policy shift in how we deal with those who are responsible for so 

much harm in this country. 

Twenty-five years ago, about 85 percent of every murder in this 

country was committed by somebody you knew very well. Today it 

is about 50 percent. That other 50 percent are stranger-related 

homicides amounting to almost 20,000 a year, the bulk of those are 

in some ways directly involved in substance abuse. And that does 

not talk about the vehicle fatalities, the overdoses and all the other 

harm that is related to drug abuse. 

If we are going to win in any way, we must begin with an education policy that shows very limited immediate results. We must 

commit to a demand reduction education policy that begins in the 

first grade, preschool, and lasts throughout all 12 years. Police 

agencies at the local level have school resource officers, DARE programs, a wide variety of things that target a lot of our middle 

schools and junior highs, but they are usually only 1 or 2 years in 

length. Outside of the three Rs in this country, I do not know what 

other things our schools need to do that are more important than 

75

to teach our children how to survive by not engaging in the destructive behavior that drug abuse and drug addiction can bring. 

We should find, whatever the method—and the Federal Government has a great deal of ability through pass-through moneys, to 

make effects upon local entities. You all know that. We need to 

begin with kindergarten, first grade, an education program. We 

must bring the parents into that education program, it should be 

voluntary, but there should be some incentive for it to be voluntary, and that incentive is that if the child of that parent winds 

up in some drug related problem, that that parent’s liability for the 

behavior of that child needs to be elevated and you can reduce that 

liability if that parent was educated along with the child in its 

abuse and drug abuse educational programs. And that would be 

the way to bring the parents into the educational process so that 

they would know how to deal with the drug-abuse related issues. 

Advertising. You know, in this country, advertising plays such a 

grand role in all of our attitudes and our behaviors and the Federal 

Government even recently in its tobacco-related issues has recognized the importance of advertising and its effect upon our young 

people. We need to commit some moneys at the national level to 

a good well-thought-out advertising program that will assist us in 

our drug education effort. Advertising is a strong medium in this 

country, we should be using it and we are not using it anywhere 

near the level it should be. 

Second, as I mentioned earlier, when the drug dealer is selling 

his wares on the corner, is when people are frightened. I believe 

we can alter the open behavior of the retail drug dealer and I think 

we can do that with concerted aggressive major enforcement directed at the street drug dealer, because he is the one that drives 

the fear in our neighborhoods. We should be able to do that by increasing our effort, our prosecutorial efforts, our courts dedicated 

to that purpose and to make him, through the risks of punishment, 

alter his behavior. 

Now I do not want you to believe that that is going to reduce in 

any way the amount of drug use in this country, and I do not offer 

that to you for that regard. I offer it to you because it will deal 

with the perception of fear that exists in our neighborhoods. When 

we can drive the drug dealer underground, when we can alter his 

behavior in such a way that he must secret himself in order to 

carry out his business, we will have given a great degree of freedom back to the people who are trapped in the cycle of fear where 

drug dealing is a major part of their neighborhood and their community. 

I think that in the certainty of punishment, history in this business has told me and taught me that it is not the length of your 

sentence, it is the certainty and the swiftness by which it occurs. 

And if we can dedicate some resources to courts, prosecution and 

some minimal kinds of mandatory sentencing, then we will alter 

the behavior of the street drug dealer. 

Finally, I would like to touch for a minute—we have just come 

through the last year of the Megan law and registration. In the 

early 1970’s there were attempts to bring about drug dealer registration. I think that with the experience that you have gained in 

the Megan laws and the registration of sex offenders, that we 

76

should now look to registering convicted drug dealers. Give them 

limited places to hide, give law enforcement the ability to know 

who they are and where they are and I believe that we can put 

some additional pressures on the street dealer and their activity 

and their behavior. 

You have my written comments. Again, I appreciate the opportunity to be here and would certainly entertain any questions that 

you may have, Mr. Chairman. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Yarbrough follows:]

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Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Sessions, would you like to start? 

Mr. SESSIONS. Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

If you could discuss with me—you are a part of task forces in our 

State, can you talk with us about this problem that we have with 

children being the brunt of drugs? Is it a product that people are 

in for the—I mean, these drug cartels, they are organized, they see 

where their market is, they market their drugs, they go and get 

other children to sell drugs. If you could just comment on this because I think there is a lot of insight about the mind of these organized drug cartels. Can you talk to us about that and them targeting our children? 

Mr. YARBROUGH. Thank you, Congressman. 

The decisions are probably not made at the cartel level because 

there are many steps in the distribution of drugs and when you get 

to the retailer—and that is the only point that really matters in the 

whole chain—if there is nobody who is the ultimate retailer, who 

sells to the user, all other things fail. It matters not what they did 

or how much they imported or anything, manufactured or grew. 

And a retailer in the drug business is not that unlike retailers in 

all business. They have niches, they have market areas, they continue to try to grow their market, they want to have a place with 

which they can sell their product and make the profit that is derived from it. 

And I suspect that the decisions are made at those levels where 

people are buying 10 pounds of marijuana, who are buying full 

ounces of cocaine. They are then deciding how they are going to 

market their shipment. And it does not differ a great deal from a 

local convenience store. They do not maintain 500 cases of CocaCola in the back, they get a shipment every day of 10 cases or 

whatever it is that they are going to sell. And they are going to 

alter their behavior to whatever market that is available. 

Nothing is more horrible than a parent who is dealing with a 

child who is demonstrating the signs of drug use and to find out 

that that child is securing his sources of drugs in and about his 

school. Someone is selling that to that child or maybe not even any 

longer a student in the school. Many of the kids who are no longer 

in school are the ones who still maintain the contacts in the school 

and who are able to be the supplier to a great number of children 

in and about that particular school. 

They become very—the circle for the individual retailer is not extremely large because if he gets too big and too reckless, he is probably going to sell to an agent of the police, which will not be to his 

advantage. And so I think that if we can alter his behavior—it is 

not going to stop it, it is not even going to slow it down, but it will 

reduce the fear and fear is a great thing that drives this country. 

When people are afraid to walk the streets, afraid to allow their 

kids to go to school, afraid to let their kids play in an apartment 

complex because of the trafficking, we should be attacking with the 

greatest vigor we know those people. 

Mr. SESSIONS. As I drive around not just the Fifth Congressional 

District of Dallas, but all around Dallas, I have been very aware 

of gang markings or what I consider to be gang markings, distinctive writings, distinctive markings that may be on a wall that I 

have always been led to believe marked a territory, indicated a 

86

presence. Do you believe or could you talk with me about street 

gangs? And I am talking about—we heard testimony earlier about 

the Bloods, the Crips, the—whatever these gangs might be. Within 

your jurisdiction, what do you see street gang activity as it relates 

to drugs and their involvement, sir? 

Mr. YARBROUGH. Well, you know, gangs are not new in our society, they have been with us for thousands of years in one form or 

another. It is relatively new, the type of violence and the drug relatedness of the gangs that we see today. 

The reasons why kids join gangs and participate in gangs are a 

sociological issue that is relatively well explained in the literature, 

but they all engage in some form of behavior that allows them to 

have money. And therefore, a great deal of it or ease of it is drug 

related. It does not mean that is all they are going to do, they burglarize cars, they steal cars, whatever happens to be available to 

them and whoever happens to contact them that has some relationship with them, they will sell drugs, they will use drugs. It is a relatively common activity for those kids in drugs to be users and 

abusers of substances. They will also sell the substance if they 

have the right approach, someone approaches them, makes it available to them, they will certainly sell it. But they are very heavily 

involved in the use of substances, illegal substances. 

The graffiti you see, you know, is another fear and intimidation 

factor. People become frightened in our cities when the buildings 

and the landscape begin to become cluttered with graffiti and one 

of the best things that we do is have graffiti abatement so we get 

it off there immediately. 

The perception of fear in our country drives so much of why our 

citizens are concerned. And reality is not always the absolute certainty, it is the perception and we must deal with the perception. 

Mr. SESSIONS. Likewise, I think it is important for us to know 

that in your vigilance to attack this, that every single call that 

comes in is from a person that probably forthrightly is trying to expect that you would do something about it and then likewise, whatever happens will determine whether they are afraid or not. So it 

is very interesting. 

Mr. YARBROUGH. Your ability to respond and satisfy the citizens’ 

expectations is whether you will be regarded well or regarded poorly. 

Mr. SESSIONS. I can tell you, sir, that one thing that comes out 

of this hearing is Special Agent Mercado telling me that where a 

city, where a community asks for help from the DEA in Texas, they 

will receive that help. That is serious, that is meaningful, as well 

as your department, when someone calls, you take very honestly 

that responsibility that you have. 

I have concluded my questions, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SOUDER. I had a couple of questions related to—I am on the 

Education Committee as well and on another subcommittee of Government Reform, which has oversight over education as well as 

interacting with the Children and Family Subcommittee and we 

just did the Juvenile Crime bill. And I had some long time interest 

and wanted to know, in your workings, not only in your home area, 

but in your State association, do you know anybody in Texas who 

has a parent liability law? 

87

Mr. YARBROUGH. Well, the family code in Texas since 1975 has 

had a family liability clause in it. The difficulty in that is that it 

is a civil process and it is outside of the adjudication of the child 

as a delinquent. It is limited now, it is raised from $5,000 to 

$10,000, you can recover up to $10,000 for damage to property by 

the actions of a child, from the parent of that child. 

This is not used, it is not workable, we need—again, it is not the 

amount of punishment, it is the certainty that something follows 

and I do not care whether it is 200 hours of community trash pickup along the side of the roadway, that is far more effective than 

something that is not used and is not going to be used. 

Mr. SOUDER. I was trying to zero in, you had an interesting concept which is that if the parents do not participate in the drug education programs, that they would be held liable, at least to some 

degree. They tried this in Los Angeles on gangs and lost a case 

where the mother had even had a cake with the gang symbols on 

it and she claimed she did not know that that was—she picked 

black and purple or something for the cake. I had a lady whose son 

had been involved in a gang tell me in Philadelphia that she was 

afraid that some of that would not work because a lot of those kids 

are very rebellious and their goal is to stick it to their parents. So 

if they knew the parents were going to be liable, they would make 

sure that the law enforcement officials knew it so their parents 

would be in trouble too. 

If you come up with or know of different things or have specific 

things, I think that is one of the most important things we need 

to look at. I do not know that we can legally do it but we have to 

get the parents directly involved because without the parental involvement, the schools are overwhelmed, law enforcement is overwhelmed and there needs to be more accountability on that side. 

I am certainly willing to look at those kinds of things, as are other 

members. It should be a State and local area, but as it overlaps 

across State lines, there may be things we can do in looking at 

that. 

Mr. YARBROUGH. Mr. Chairman, as you well know, you find a 

great deal of education in this country and you set a great precedence and tone for what education will be like in this country, even 

though it is a State issue and even more so, a local issue. But the 

Federal Government has long used its financial ability to alter behavior at certain levels. And I believe that a commitment to a program from K through 12 for substance abuse education and for the 

parents to be voluntarily included and resource made available to 

teach the parents the same kinds of things taught the child so that 

they can assist the school and be assisted in working with their 

children in the drug abuse-related problems, and you can offset 

that with the kinds of State statutes which you can also influence, 

as you are well aware, through certain pass-through moneys, that 

would hold the parents somewhat responsible. And a parent’s participation in this education process would be in the legal sense, a 

minimizer in their liability, for their child’s conduct. 

You know, it is a sad set of circumstances and we see it many 

times in our local business where a single family mother is abused 

and beaten by her 14-year-old child. But that problem really did 

not start at 13. And there is nothing one can do if that is when 

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the problem began and there had been good parenting and good 

care and good education prior to that. But then there is no liability 

on the parents’ part, we are all responsible for our individual conduct at some point. 

Mr. SOUDER. I think we are kicking a lot of problems at the 

schools that started with fundamental problems in the individual 

and in families and in looking at how the schools can address this, 

certainly the hottest—this next statement is not going to be popular, but I want to get your reaction to it—in looking at how to address a lot of the drug issues, I think there has been so much pressure on law enforcement, saying why is the problem not going 

down, that almost uniformly, I do not care what agency it is, Federal, State, local, it is like well, we are going to solve this through 

education. Yet, interestingly, the only data we have on the few programs that are out there, and DARE is arguably, in my opinion, 

the best in the country, is not good. It is even worse than law enforcement data in the sense of whether it is getting its changes. 

In the kids that you see, I have a daughter who is a freshman, 

now is going to be a sophomore in college, a son who is a senior 

in high school as well as one in elementary school. My kids are 

pretty straight, I say that with the hope of many parents. But I get 

this feeling from their friends that for the most part, it is not a 

lack of knowledge in the kids about what the drugs are or even 

that cocaine or heroin may not be actually dangerous, but a lot of 

it is a feeling that a lot of this stuff is not that important, adults 

may smoke and drink, therefore what is the big deal with marijuana or methamphetamine. They start into that and they never 

intended to get involved in the other, but knowledge may not be 

the problem here. 

How do we get to the next step? We are winning the battle from 

kindergarten to sixth grade, not too many of those kids will say 

drugs are good. Somewhere in there, we are transferring at junior 

high and high school where in spite of the fact of saying it is good, 

we are seeing an increase in the number of students who say marijuana is not dangerous, we have seen increasing tolerance, dangerous trends even as adults have backed away from some of these 

hard drugs. How would you approach the education angle? I 

thought the parents was an interesting wrinkle and I thought also 

the registering of drug dealers much like we are in juvenile justice 

trying to have some of that even be in the record of some of these 

kids because the dealers are just using the kids. But have you 

thought much—and as you think of things too, if you can pass it 

through to Congressman Sessions and others—how would you approach the education differently than we have, given the fact that 

we have been trying to sound this drum beat when the kids become 

at risk? 

Mr. YARBROUGH. I guess there are really two real quick pieces. 

And I am certainly not qualified to lay out an education program, 

that is not my expertise by any means. I think there are people 

who are very capable, I think we need to continue to press something that begins from K through 12 and we need to build piece 

upon piece in recognizing as peer pressures change in the 6th, 7th, 

8th grade, as they change in the 10th and 11th grades, and as 

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things change, that we have a program designed by people much 

smarter than I am, as to how to deal with that. 

We are not going to be 100 percent successful. Peer pressure at 

13 is far more important than your ability. You know, you had your 

chance for the first 7, 6, 9, 10 years. After that, somebody else is 

beginning to take over a great deal in the behavior formation of our 

children. 

I just think if we commit to something that begins here and ends 

here through 12 years and we bring the parent into it, we now at 

least have the two pieces. You know, I—law enforcement, teaching 

drug abuse education is probably not the world’s greatest idea. The 

new wrinkle at our local level now in the States is teaching aggressive behavior kinds of programs, to teach the children how to deal 

with aggressive behavior as opposed to getting a razor, a hatpin, 

a gun or something else and settling the problem. 

I just believe there are an awful lot of bright people, and you 

work with education people a great deal, that can design something. If we are not trying, we are certainly not going to succeed 

and I do not see us trying with a real comprehensive approach to 

it. And you know, there is not much results, it is 12 years from 

now before we are going to know what the results are, and that is 

not always the best laid plan. I cannot support anything, you know, 

next election. 

Mr. SOUDER. Well, I thank you for your testimony. You have 

touched on one other area that you hit a raw nerve on and that 

is advertising, which to some degree is a spin off the media and 

I just want to say on behalf of our colleague, John Mica from Florida, this has been a pet peeve of ours. We have had in front of our 

subcommittee the Partnership of Drug Free America, which has absolutely brilliant ads devised by the best marketers in the country. 

If they would run it at sometime other than 4:30 a.m., it might be 

helpful in trying to reach people and quite frankly, if we do not see 

some response out of our national media, his bill will gain more 

momentum, which demands that the networks spend a certain 

amount of time in each given time period, in helping us with this, 

because there is no question that the entertainment issue—and 

this is a bipartisan effort where I congratulate the President and 

Vice President for helping keep the pressure on Hollywood—we had 

a hearing out there—the pressure in the music industry, because 

it is frightening what kind of garbage is going through and we can 

do a little classroom talk here or there or parents can try to reach 

the kids, but if they are playing on certain stations this kind of 

stuff, what industry even holds up sometimes—I got into an argument over with one song, Heroin Girl, which is supposed to be their 

model of an anti-drug song, but it certainly had a second message 

inside that. And it was a frustrating process if that’s the best they 

can do to try to fight drugs. 

So we will continue to work at multiple levels and I want to congratulate you and the others who are fighting the battle here at 

home in every community because you are the front line of defense 

and, as you say, there are citizens afraid to come out of their 

homes, people afraid to go shopping, afraid to jog at night, kids 

afraid to go out on the playgrounds. It is very distressing to go into 

any urban city in this country and have every single child there be 

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able to say they have heard gunshots in the last period of time. 

You cannot have equal opportunity and an equal chance in this 

country when there are people who are in those kinds of situations 

and it has penetrated everywhere. 

Mr. Sessions, do you have any closing comments? 

Mr. SESSIONS. Just as a closing comment, I would like to thank 

each of the people who have been here today. I will tell you that 

we have the most professional law enforcement that we assembled 

today. This was designed to get information, not only to Congressman Souder and myself, for us to take to Washington, but it also 

has been designed for the students who are here today. 

I would like to thank you. I would like to be a person who can 

stand up, and I am a person who can stand up and tell you that 

I have never ever, ever smoked at minimum a marijuana cigarette, 

I do not participate in illegal drug use and I will tell you that if 

anybody thinks that that is cool that you are involved in drug 

usage, you are making a mistake. 

Last, I want to thank the media who has taken time to be here 

today. They are an important part of this process, because they get 

the message out. This cannot be won or lost just by law enforcement or by Members of Congress or by even kids. It has to be a 

joint participation with people who write newspapers and who buy 

ink by the barrel and who have TV stations and airwaves. 

So I applaud them for being here today and I will tell you that 

I am extremely pleased, sir, to see the people who were here from 

the media who care, not just about the hot story, but care about 

our children. 

And last, sir, I want to thank you for taking time out of your 

schedule. I know it was a diversion for you, as Chairman Hastert 

was unable to be here, but thank you for taking time and I welcome any way we are able to work together in your leadership in 

this area. 

Mr. SOUDER. I want to thank all of you for making this hearing 

so successful. This is how we get information. For those of you who 

are watching, we do this around the country, we collect this. As a 

former committee staff director and staffer, I know how important 

it is that they absorb the information as we do different reports, 

and I also want to say that it is really great, I know this is not 

just a flattery statement, it is great to have Congressman Sessions 

in Congress because he is committed to law enforcement. This is 

not an election year. Too many people talk about drugs in an election year. The key thing is do you talk about it in a non-election 

year. 

It is great to be here, great to see people on the front lines and 

I commend all of you. 

This hearing of the Subcommittee on National Security, International Affairs, and Criminal Justice is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 1:19 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

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