Pot times
Surveyor Testifies In School-zone Drug Sale Trial
URL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v05/n1111/a11.htmlNewshawk: Humphrey Ploughjogger
Pubdate: Thu, 14 Jul 2005 SURVEYOR TESTIFIES IN SCHOOL-ZONE DRUG SALE TRIAL
Source: Berkshire Eagle, The (Pittsfield, MA)
Contact:
mailto:letters@berkshireeagle.com>letters@berkshireeagle.com
Website: <http://www.berkshireeagle.com/>http://www.berkshireeagle.com/
Address: PO Box 1171, Pittsfield, MA 01202
Fax: (413) 499-3419
Copyright: 2005 New England Newspapers, Inc.
Author: Ellen G. Lahr, Berkshire Eagle Staff
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?217
(Drug-Free Zones)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?199
(Mandatory Minimum Sentencing)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?225
(Students - United States)
Related: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v05/n1091/a12.html
Related: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v05/n882/a04.html
Related: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v05/n779/a04.html
PITTSFIELD -- On a single day last Oct. 27, land surveyor Eugene Galvagni
Jr. was guided by an undercover police officer to at least 17 spots in and
around the Taconic parking lot area in Great Barrington, where drugs and money
had swapped hands during the prior summer.
Galvagni hammered nails into the ground to mark locations that undercover
investigator Felix Aguirre had pinpointed as the site of drug deals he had made
with 17 young people. Where nails didn't work, Galvagni used paint to mark
the spots.
According to Galvagni's Superior Court testimony yesterday in the trial of Kyle
Sawin, 18, he returned to measure the distances from those spots to the Great
Barrington Co-operative Preschool and the Searles/Bryant School complex. A
veteran of school-zone measures for court cases, Galvagni said during his
testimony that he was hired by the Berkshire district attorney's office last
fall to verify that 17 young people had made their drug deals within 1,000 feet
of the two Great Barrington schools.
A school-zone drug charge carries a minimum mandatory two-year jail term.
A total of 18 people were arrested in late September in connection with the
investigation that began in January 2004 and that picked up steam during the
summer. Seventeen were facing school-zone charges along with other drug
dealing offenses. One suspect caught in the sting allegedly made her drug
sale outside the school zone.
Sawin, facing three charges of marijuana distribution and three charges of
violating drug laws within a school zone, allegedly sold drugs to an undercover
officer on June 30, July 6 and Sept. 3, well within school-zone
boundaries, according to testimony.
Galvagni, who said he has measured some 200 school zones for the district
attorney's office over the years, measured one of Sawin's sales as occurring 498
feet from the preschool entrance and 856 feet from Searles/Bryant. Two
other sales ranged from 509 feet to 713 feet from the preschool, but beyond the
Searles/ Bryant boundary. The preschool was closed for the summer at the
time Sawin allegedly swapped drugs for money with Aguirre. Two of the 18
arrested have already pleaded guilty to their charges. A marijuana
distribution case against Alexandra Brenner, 18, was continued in District Court
in March without a finding.
A more serious slate of charges against Ryan Babcock, 20, of Housatonic resulted
Monday in a state prison sentence of four to six years for both cocaine and
marijuana dealing in a school zone. Babcock pleaded guilty in Superior
Court. Sawin is the first to challenge the charges against him in a jury
trial. He is also one of seven suspects whose cases have been championed
by a newly formed organization, Concerned Citizens for Appropriate Justice,
which has raised a protest against District Attorney David F. Capeless'
use of the school-zone law against first-time offenders.
Entrapment alleged Sawin's attorney, Judith Knight, has indicated that she
intends to show that her client was a victim of police entrapment, a vulnerable
young man who would not have sold drugs were it not for the pressure and
coercion of Aguirre. Knight may have a challenge ahead, according to other
attorneys keeping an eye on the case as a possible harbinger of what is to come
for their own clients. Knight must show that Sawin was the victim of a
police setup. But during opening arguments yesterday, Assistant District
Attorney Richard Locke told the 14-member jury that Sawin was, in fact, an
"entrepreneur," who carried marijuana, a scale and plastic bags in his
backpack last summer while selling drugs not just to Aguirre, but also to
others, some of whom wound up being arrested in the September sweep.
At one point in June 2004, said Locke, Sawin announced to friends in the parking
lot: "I need to know what people want, because I'm going out and bagging
up." Aguirre, on that occasion, bought a $50 bag of marijuana, said Locke,
who recounted two other instances, one of which included sales to two other
people. Knight, presenting her opening argument to the jury, said that the
proximity of the schools to the Taconic parking lot had no effect on
schoolchildren, and that children were not targeted or sought out for drug
sales. The schools and the parking lot are not within eyesight of each
other, she noted, and are separated by Main Street and a commercial area.
"It was not known to be a school zone," she said. "The
officers knew it and set up the buys there."
The Berkshire County Drug Task Force, she said, "swooped down on Great
Barrington," lodging drug charges and school-zone charges against 17
people, 11 of whom were teenagers, she said. She described it as an
overzealous investigation and now an overzealous prosecution.
Sawin, she said, wanted to fit in, wanted to be cool, had a summer job and hung
out where his friends were. The methods of Aguirre, she said, were
"entirely questionable," and Sawin was a "vulnerable, susceptible
teenager." Aguirre, she said, was aggressive and persistent with Sawin and
others "and would not take no for an answer."
Knight has kept Sawin's case in the context of the larger investigation,
ensuring with her questioning that the jury is alerted that 17 other people were
targeted in the drug sweep last year.
Trooper testifies During a half-day of trial business yesterday, the jury also
heard testimony from state police Trooper Christopher J. Mieklejohn, the
drug evidence officer for the drug task force.
After Locke questioned him about the chain of evidence for the drugs purchased
by Aguirre, Knight took a turn, asking him to recount a bit about the years he
has spent as an undercover police officer.
Setting the stage for her questioning of Aguirre, Knight asked Mieklejohn
whether it is his job to trick, deceive or lie to gain the trust of suspects.
"Your objective is to blend in," said Mieklejohn, "to become part
of the subculture."
Testimony will continue today.
