Flowers Takes Stand
By Rick Young
Staff Writer
After a week of stage setting the government put its star witness in the James Wade federal drug trial ion the witness stand Monday.
Donnie Flowers, whom Wade said was a confidential informant for him and who the government alleges was one of Wade's business partners in a conspiracy to manufacture and distribute methamphetamines, took the witness stand at 1:30 p.m. Monday and began detailing what prosecutors say is a story of high-level corruption of a law officer. Prosecutor Paul E Naman has said testimony by Flowers will establish the government's case against the one-term sheriff of Orange County.
Flowers was arrested by Hardin County officers Oct. 19, 1987 as he and two others were involved in setting up a drug lab in that county. In his possession at the time were an AR-15 rifle, which prosecutors have traced to Wade , a blank deposit slip trac3ed to the Orange County sheriff's evidence room. The pump according to the FBI was seized during a raid on a Jap Lane residence in Vidor in which Nyles Henry baker, formerly Wade's co defendant in the case, was arrested.
During the first of what attorneys believe will be several days of testimony, Flowers detailed how Wade purportedly gave him $1,500 to purchase chemicals with which to set up the drug manufacturing operation. Flowers said Wade told him the money had come from the county narcotics by fund and had to be returned quickly. Flowers said he gave wade $1,200 in cash and a dinner ring in return, with which the sheriff was reportedly not pleased.
Flowers, who has been described by defense lawyers as a "government employee" due to his involvement in the FBI witness protection program and the fact that he has cut a deal with the government that allows him to trade testimony against Wade for his own immunity from charges in the case, was escorted to and from the Grayson County courthouse by a federal marshals. The trial is being held in Sherman on a change of venue from Beaumont on orders of Federal District Judge Howell Cobb, who is hearing the case.
Flowers' Orange County arrest record dates back to 1979. He has never been convicted. He told the jury Monday that he had, indeed, acted as an informant for Wade beginning in 1985. One of his earliest efforts included the Feb. 21, 1985, raid at 2010 and 2020 Concord Road in Vidor in which Flowers, Harvey Lee Fabriguze, Michael Alan Woodard and Gregory Warren were arrested. All were charged with felony possession of a controlled substance and felony possession of marijuana in that raid. Drugs seized on that occasion were valued at $14,000, according to then-Capt. Bob Stinett. Stinett is expected to be called later as a witness by the defense.
Flowers testified that approached by Wade in early 1986 to begin the drug operation. He said he managed to blow up two laboratories in his early efforts at cooking meth. After Baker's probation was moved from Harris to Orange County, Flowers said, the operation began to smooth out and business picked up. Flowers said he paid Wade over $5000 in cash and two gold rings in 1987 as Wade's share of the drug profits.
Defense attorneys, scheduled to begin cross examination of Flowers Tuesday, say one of the questions they want answered by the confessed drug manufacturer and dealer is, if he was, alleged by both him and the government, under Wade's protection to make and sell drugs in Orange County, why was he setting up a lab in Hardin County? This has been a pervasive question both with Wade's present attorneys, Jeff Kearney of Fort Worth, and Gary Richardson of Tulsa Okla., and his former attorney John Hannah of Tyler.
"It just makes no sense whatever that he would be setting up a lab in another county if he was protected in Orange County," Hannah said shortly after accepting Wade's case earlier this year.
Wade has said since news of his being the target of an FBI probe was released Jan. 29 that he was actually the subject of a conspiracy by drug kingpins in the county who wanted him out of office becuase his anti drug policies had hurt their business. Wade's pursuit o drug dealers earned him a citation from Gov. William Clements' 9office for having effected more drug arrests per capita than any other county in Texas and the awarding of $150,000 grant to continue those efforts. The grant was withdrawn and awarded to other law enforcement entities in the county after new of the FBI probe became public.
During opening arguments in Wade's trial, his attorneys told the jury the sheriff had pretended to be crooked in order to catch drug dealers.
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