DRCNet has thrice before reported on the case of Andrew Chambers, the Drug Enforcement Administration's tarnished supersnitch (http://www.drcnet.org/wol/124.html#scandals2and3 and http://www.drcnet.org/wol/139.html#supersnitch and http://www.drcnet.org/wol/161.html#supersnitch). The St. Louis native made a lucrative career as a narc, earning at least the $2.2 million the DEA has admitted paying him, and helping to send more than 400 people to prison since 1984. Unfortunately for Chambers, the DEA and US Attorneys around the country, he has also been outed as a serial perjurer.
Last year, after the St. Louis Post-Dispatch broke the story, then Attorney General Janet Reno ordered the DEA to suspend Chambers. Then DEA Chief of Operations Richard Fiano told the Post-Dispatch at the time that the agency was conducting an internal investigation. But the agency has refused to release the results, although it had promised to do so. Nor has it responded to written questions about the report from the Post-Dispatch, although it had promised to do so.
As of this writing, DEA officials have
not responded to DRCNet requests to see the report. DRCNet has filed
a Freedom of Information Act request for the report with the DEA.
(But don't hold your breath. Uncooperative federal agencies can take
months or years to process FOIA requests, appeals of rejections take even
DRCNet has thrice before reported on the
case of Andrew Chambers, the Drug Enforcement Administration's tarnished
supersnitch (http://www.drcnet.org/wol/124.html#scandals2and3
and http://www.drcnet.org/wol/139.html#supersnitch
and http://www.drcnet.org/wol/161.html#supersnitch).
The St. Louis native made a lucrative career as a narc, earning at least
the $2.2 million the DEA has admitted paying him, and helping to send more
than 400 people to prison since 1984. Unfortunately for Chambers,
the DEA and US Attorneys around the country, he has also been outed as
a serial perjurer.
Last year, after the St. Louis Post-Dispatch
broke the story, then Attorney General Janet Reno ordered the DEA to suspend
Chambers. Then DEA Chief of Operations Richard Fiano told the Post-Dispatch
at the time that the agency was conducting an internal investigation.
But the agency has refused to release the results, although it had promised
to do so. Nor has it responded to written questions about the report
from the Post-Dispatch, although it had promised to do so.
As of this writing, DEA officials have
not responded to DRCNet requests to see the report. DRCNet has filed
a Freedom of Information Act request for the report with the DEA.
(But don't hold your breath. Uncooperative federal agencies can take
months or years to process FOIA requests, appeals of rejections take even
longer, and in many cases, when documents are finally released, they are
so heavily redacted as to be practically useless.)
The report presumably contains information
showing that DEA agents, senior officials and US Attorneys were aware of
Chambers' mendacious ways, but continued to use him nonetheless while not
revealing their knowledge of his credibility problems to defendants, their
attorneys and the courts.
Now, US Attorneys in Los Angeles have settled
a drug dealing case rather than reveal the investigation's results to a
defense attorney. In January, they said Dave Daly deserved a life
sentence for his sixth drug law violation, a PCP sale. But last month,
they let him plead to one count of using a telephone in a drug transaction,
and he walked out of the jail where he had spent the last three years awaiting
trial.
US Attorneys and the DEA cut a deal whose
primary beneficiaries, other than Daly, appear to be exposed drug agents
and government prosecutors. The deal that sent Daly home had three
provisions, his attorney, John Martin, told the Post-Dispatch. Daly
had to give up his right to see the DEA investigation, withdraw his motion
accusing the government of misconduct, and stipulate that there was no
government misconduct.
Prosecutors have acknowledged that Chambers
was the chief witness against Daly, that they knew of his history of lying
in court, and that they failed to tell the defense.
"There were a lot of agents who knew that,
and I think that's what they wanted to cover up," said Martin. "That
was the price of getting Daly out of jail."
Demanding that the prosecution produce
the DEA investigation "made the deal" to free his client, Martin told the
Post-Dispatch. He told the St. Louis paper he believes the report
will show that DEA agents repeatedly condoned perjury and will reveal government
misconduct serious enough to have derailed any attempt to prosecute Daly.
Martin and Daly may never know what the
DEA report says and, if the agency has its way, neither will the rest of
us.
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