Oakland Police Scandal Triggers Drug Case Dismissal

OAKLAND, Calif. -- In the wake a growing police scandal, Alameda County District Attorney Tom Orloff announced Tuesday that his office was forced to dismiss charges in a case involving evidence that was illegally seized by Oakland police officers based on a faulty search warrant. The is the first such case the district attorney's office has had to dismiss following the Oakland Police Department's recent disclosure that some officers used what they claimed were narcotics obtained through undercover buys from suspected drug dealers as probable cause to search the suspects' homes. The searches were carried out before a crime lab could confirm that the purchased substances were actually illegal drugs. Orloff said he doesn't know whether his office will be forced to dismiss any other such cases. "We're looking at other cases and making disclosures to defense attorneys about defects" in the search warrants, he said. The case dismissed Monday involved Reginald Oliver, a convicted drug dealer who was arrested in March after Oakland police officers bought what they believed were drugs from him during a controlled buy and then obtained an illegal warrant to search his home. During the search, police found ammunition and a magazine for an assault rifle, and Oliver was charged with being an ex-felon in possession of ammunition. Orloff said the search warrant was faulty because a test hadn't been conducted to determine if the substance officers bought from Oliver was in fact an illegal drug. Oakland police weren't immediately available for comment today. Assistant Police Chief Howard Jordan said last week that the department learned through a routine internal affairs investigation seven weeks ago that a small group of officers may have obtained search warrants in drug cases improperly. Jordan said the department was conducting an investigation into the situation and the officers who may have obtained the search warrants improperly have been reassigned. He refused to say how many officers are involved. Sgt. Michael Poirier told reporters last week that even though the search warrants are flawed, they may not necessarily be fatally flawed if police and prosecutors can convince judges that the warrants were obtained in good faith. Orloff said he agreed that some cases might be salvageable if his office can show that there was probable cause for a search aside from the drugs. However, "it depends on the judge" and most judges don't like it if they think police officers have lied to them, Orloff said.