European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - July 1, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse Page 10 the stars and stripes a is a m1�� Ltd a xxx James Rowley / i >v.��. A a -. It a the videotape showing Washington mayor Marion Barry smoking crack cocaine gives defense lawyers plenty of grist but Little compelling evidence to argue that their client was entrapped by the Fri. The tape played thursday for jurors at barrys drug and perjury trial in . District court for the District of Columbia shows Barry taking a makeshift pipe putting it to his Mouth and inhaling the smoke of burning crack cocaine. Barry takes a second a a hit on the pipe and puts on his suit jacket before Fri agents and police storm into the downtown hotel room to arrest him. A Kenneth Mundy barrys chief defense lawyer has argued that the mayor was an inexperienced drug user who was lured to the hotel room by a former Girlfriend Rasheeda Moore. The former Model testified that Barry was reluctant to come up to her room at the Vista International hotel. In a recorded Telephone Call the mayor said Quot there Are too Many Nosy roses this and other comments by the mayor before he smokes the crack will undoubtedly be cited by Mundy to try to convince jurors that Barry was pressured into doing something he did no to want to do. The videotaped conversation Between Barry and Moore gives Mundy some basis for this argument. But it also contains statements from Barry that prosecutors can cite to argue that the mayor was an experienced drug user who willingly purchased and smoked the illegal drug. For instance Barry alludes to prior drug use saying at one Point t done to smoke no More at another Point he tells her a go get some. Go get at another the mayor asks Moore if she has a pipe to smoke the crack. The mayor voices reluctance to smoke the cocaine unless Moore joined in. But Moore spurns his repeated requests saying Quot it makes me too hyper i get really a if you done to do it in a not going to do it a the mayor says. Richard Benveniste a Washington defense attorney said Mundy can a highlight the Means under which the recorded portion of the evidence was set a you can Point to the fact that the government brought the witness Here to be used As a Decoy paid for her Bills at the Beauty parlor babysat her children to help the Fri catch the mayor he said a in this Case i think there is substantial ammunition if you Are dealing Only with that incident a Ben Anthony Lewis entrapment venite said. But the Law of entrapment requires the defendant to show that he would not have performed the illegal act unless pressured by the police. More has testified that she and the mayor used cocaine More than 100 times on previous occasions. Convicted drug dealer Charles Lewis recounted a series of episodes of cocaine use with Barry. A the amount of information that has been brought Forward is staggering in terms of the extent of drug use that is now alleged by witnesses under oath a Ben venite said. Quot it certainly helps them prosecutors rebut any argument of entrapment on the basis of disposition a he said. Joseph Digenova a former . Attorney who investigated Barry for Many years without bringing any charges said the tape does no to help the entrapment the gave her Money for the drugs he waited for the drugs he never said during the entire time a i done to do drugs or a take those away a a Digenova said. 1 Quot she did no to Force it on him a the former prosecutor said Quot he goes Over and picks up the pipe and lights it himself.�?�. Even though Barry tried in vain to persuade Moore to take the pipe first a the did no to walk out he did t say a i wont use us a Digenova said. A she decided hot to so he went a a it a very interesting he never puts his coat on to leave until he takes the second hit of the cocaine a Digenova said. A then he puts the coat on. That a the image that the jury is going to editor s note a James Rowley covers the Justice department for the associated press right to die Issue hinges on definition of Liberty for seven years Nancy Cruzan has lain in a Missouri Hospital in a vegetative state insensible to her surroundings kept alive by artificial feeding tubes. Last week the supreme court rejected her parents plea to have the tubes disconnected and let her die in the court did not turn away generally from the problem of the right to die. On the contrary eight justices said the problem engages the Constitution. That opens profound possibilities. It Means that this extremely sensitive question May in the future be explored in terms of constitutional Law illuminated by judges. The problem is far More acute and far reaching than most of us realize. About 2 million people die m the United states every year and More than half of those deaths occur when some life sustaining treatment is ended. All those cases involve As Justice Brennan put it in his dissenting opinion a decision on a a medical procedure that could prolong the process of the Constitution comes into the question in the clause of the 14th amendment providing that no state May deprive any person of Quot Liberty without due process of Law. Over nearly 70 years the supreme court has read that open ended language to forbid slate intrusion into certain vital areas of individual autonomy. One constant theme in the decisions has been the integrity of the body. Thus the court has condemned the for Ceable pumping of a prisoners stomach to look for evidence. It has said that the for Ceable injection of anti psychotic drugs interferes with a person s Liberty under the 14th amendment. Chief Justice Rehnquist writing for a 5to-4 majority in the Cruzan Case said that the past decisions pointed toward a constitutional Liberty of patients to refuse life sustaining medical treatment food and water. But assuming that was so he said a state was still Quot entitled to guard against potential abuses in such situations Quot. On that ground the majority upheld a Missouri Law requiring that there be Quot Clear and convince mgr evidence of an incompetent patient s prior expressed wish not to be kept artificially alive. The Missouri courts found that Nancy Cruzan had not so clearly expressed that wish and Rehnquist said the Constitution did not require that her parents be allowed now to speak for her. Justice of Connor who was part of the majority of five went further in a separate opinion. If before becoming disabled a person designates parents or someone else to make life and death decisions for her she said then the Constitution might Well require the state to carry out those decisions. The four dissenters said that Missouri a High Standard of evidence unconstitutionally burdened Nancy Cruzana a desire to avoid artificial mechanisms which they said she had sufficiently expressed before her Accident. Those four votes together with of Connors would be enough to establish a constitutional right to die in a future Case where the patients wish is undeniably Clear. J the court was understandably tentative in entering the area of what the chief Justice called a a perplexing question with unusually Strong moral and ethical enter it did. In doing so it confounded certain conservative Legal arguments and expectations. Judge Robert Bork whose nomination to the supreme court was rejected by the Senate in 1987, argued that the guarantee of a Liberty Quot in the 14th amendment is too vague for the courts to enforce. Justice Scalia in a concurring opinion in the Cruzan Case said he would have preferred to say a that the Federal courts have no business in this the Wall Street journal whose editorials speak for the Legal philosophy of the far right deplored the approach of the Cruzan decision. it said with regret that a the supreme court and courts generally have become the institution to which so Many people now turn for guidance on problems of conscience and turning to judges on such profound questions does present risks. But on the whole our courts in the process of expounding the Constitution have done a fair Job of helping to keep this country stable and free. And the judges have made the rest of us think about moral issues. The Cruzan Case itself illustrates the Point. The court gave no Relief to Nancy Cruzan. But it made Many of us think about the cruelty of forcing such indignity on a family. I suspect that the state of Missouri itself will now relent from that wrong illuminated by the supreme court. C new York times
