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Highlands Today

NO. 3: MISSING EVIDENCE

Brad Dickerson/Highlands Today

The buds on the plants were extremely large, with authorities saying they were among the largest they've ever seen.

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By GARY PINNELL

Highlands Today

Published: December 31, 2008

SEBRING - It was a case that threatened to unseat Highlands County's top law enforcement officer: 33 pieces of evidence had been lost, according to an April report.

There were 31,700 pieces stored in evidence by December 2007, said an unsigned five-page inventory released by Sheriff Susan Benton, including 4,671 tagged bags of drugs, firearms or money.

One of every 20 items was randomly selected by a computer, and an audit team was formed to locate them in the evidence rooms. They couldn't find 33.

Although she didn't suspect anyone of purposely removing the items, Sheriff Susan Benton referred the matter to internal affairs for an investigation.

"We expanded our testing scope to all the items received from (the Florida Department of Law Enforcement) during the month of September 2007," the report said. "It appears these items were inadvertently placed in a location for disposal and were disposed."

Interpretation: They were set beside a trash container and thrown away, Benton explained later.

Benton was running for a second term, and her opponents took her to task. More of the story came out.

The sheriff's office busted dozens of grow houses during the previous year, and stored the green marijuana in portable metal units, where it literally melted. Deputies learned later, from Polk County counterparts, that they should have dried the marijuana first.

"Due to decay, the cannabis items, along with their packaging and labels, have merged into a compost-like state," the evidence report said.

That was part of the problem, the sheriff explained. Since 2004, there's been a 270 percent explosion in the volume of evidence the sheriff's office has confiscated, the audit noted.

"This staff is just overwhelmed," Benton said.

Even so, she found no forgiveness from the lawyers.

State Attorney Jerry Hill met with Benton for two hours to discuss evidence handling and procedures. Within 30 days, he demanded, under the supervision of an outside, independent agency, Benton must agree to document every gun, dollar bill, drug cash and DNA evidence in the inventory, as well as one in four of the rest of the 35,000 items.

They also agreed to revisit Stephen Newell's 13-page report. Newell, a 34-year police veteran, a former watch commander of the Palm Beach Sheriff's Office, and an assistant police chief at the Pahokee Police Department, had been asked to inventory the evidence room, but was dismissed after his report was released.

The sheriff insinuated Newell was incompetent; her attorney, Mike Durham, called Newell a disgruntled former employee. Furious, Newell said he was "thrown under the bus."

Hill believed Newell: "Certain issues were raised in a lengthy report by a former employee who reviewed the evidence room. Each point raised will be responded to," he instructed Benton.

Some of the evidence was later found, Durham said. "Some of it was misfiled."

But in August, attorney Justin Gaines asked Judge Peter Estrada to dismiss the marijuana evidence against his client, Nelson Rodriguez, since it could no longer be produced in court or weighed. Gaines' motion was denied.

"In cases where destroyed evidence is determined to have been potentially useful," Estrada wrote, "a due process violation requires a showing of bad faith on the part of the state."

In October, Benton's office completed the inventory of about 8,000 evidence items, and Benton was re-elected.

Highlands Today Senior Reporter Gary Pinnell can be reached at 863-386-5828 and gpinnell@highlandstoday.com.

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