Beaumont Enterprise
August 23, 1988
Flowers testifies about 'drug scheme'
By Margaret Toal
Staff Writer
SHERMAN - Donnie James Flowers, who admitted he "cooked" methamphetamine, testified Monday that he gave James Wade $5,200 in cash and two gold rings in 1987.
Flowers, 27, who is an unindicted co-conspirator in a federal drug case against Wade, testified all Monday afternoon about his dealings with Wade, whom he called "Boss," in an alleged drug operation.
Wade became Orange County sheriff in 1985 and was removed from office July 11 on order of sate district judge.
He has pleaded innocent of the charges and his attorney told the jury Wade pretended to be crooked to catch drug dealers.
Flowers' testimony described what he called a "drug scheme" that he said Wade started in early 1986.
The operation included Wade giving Flowers money from the county's special drug investigation fund to buy chemicals to make methamphetamine, Flowers said.
When prosecutor Paul Naman asked Flowers about Wade's finances, Flowers replied: "He was constantly telling me he was in the hole and he needed more to get his debts out."
Flowers also said Wade sent warnings of possible arrests through telephone pagers and gave him numerous pieces of chemistry glassware and marijuana from the county's evidence room.
Methamphetamine, a crystal or powdered from of "speed," is made, or "cooked" in clandestine laboratories.
People in the courtroom have smelled traces of the distinctive musty odor from the chemical process as FBI agents have displayed confiscated lab equipment. At one point Monday, an alternate juror complained about the smell of equipment left near jurors.
Jurors got out of their chairs and leaned of the jury box to watch as Flowers left the witness stand and described the functions f various pieces of glassware stored in padded gun cases. Flowers said the cases protected the glass from breaking.
Flowers testified Wade gave him the gun cases with glassware from the evidence room.
Hardin County Sheriff H. R. "Mike" Holzapfel this past week identified the gun cases and glassware as having been confiscated in an October 1987 Hardin County drug raid in which Flowers was arrested.
Flowers testified about how he became a drug informant for Wade in early 1985. About a year later. he said, Wade approached him about starting a methamphetamine operation.
Nyle Henry Baker, 58, was arrested in December 1985 and subsequently convicted of involvement in a methamphetamine lab. Flowers said Wade told him he believed Baker's operation brought in about $2 million a year.
Flowers testified that the lab equipment Wade got from the county evidence room originally was from the Baker bust. He said Wade arranged from Baker's parole to be transferred to Orange County in 1987 when Baker was released from prison.
Baker was indicted with Wade on one count of conspiracy to make and sell drugs.
Flowers testified that the alleged drug operation didn't make much money until Baker joined "the club" and organized the operation.
Flowers mentioned two different times he blew up labs during the highly volatile manufacturing process. Once, he hid cocaine in bandages covering his burned arm, when Orange County deputies stopped him and Bobby Lee Rogers in Rogers' truck, he said.
Rogers, 31, and Addie Guillory, 31, also are unindicted co-conspirators.
Wade got Guillory out of Hardin County Jail on personal recognizance in 1986 to "cook," Flowers testified.
About a month later, after Guillory was arrested in Houston, Wade arranged hi bond and Flowers and Rogers drove there and picked him up, Flowers said.
In July 1986, Wade told Flowers to give information to Orange County sheriff's Lt. Larry Franklin so that Guillory could be arrested, Flows testified.
Flowers is under a federal witness protection program and wad escorted by U. S. marshals. He told the jury he will not be prosecuted on the federal allegations but does face a prison term on the pending state charges against him in Hardin County.
Naman told U. S. District Judge Howell Cobb he expects about an hour more of testimony from flowers today before defense attorneys begin cross-examination.
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