State Lacks Manpower to Fight Cocaine Dealers, Atty. Gen. Says

Atty. Gen. John K. Van de Kamp said Wednesday that state narcotics agents know of more than 5,000 suspected Colombian cocaine traffickers in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Sacramento counties alone, but that they don’t have the manpower to deal with what he called “the No. 1 organized crime threat in California.”

Van de Kamp, also a Democratic candidate for governor, made the remarks at a conference of California organized crime and anti-terrorism specialists. He praised local drug agencies for their efforts against well-organized Colombian cocaine cartels but said identification of traffickers does not mean they will be caught.

“We are trying to fight a big-league drug problem with a little-league enforcement team,” Van de Kamp said.

The attorney general said he will direct “every penny and every agent” available to the state at the Colombian cocaine network, but said more federal help is needed.

“We haven’t been quiet, we have just been ignored,” he said.

State narcotics enforcement officials echoed the concern that suspected Colombian traffickers are operating freely.

“The irony is that we know who they are, but we don’t have the resources to get them. We have to show in court they are dealing beyond a doubt and it is hard to get informants--the traffickers are pretty violent folks,” said Tom Gorman, assistant chief for the state narcotics enforcement bureau.

The attorney general said a federal crackdown on cocaine in South Florida has caused an exodus of traffickers to the “promised land” of California. He called on Bush Administration Drug Czar William Bennett to come up with a comprehensive national plan that will prevent drug traffickers from simply relocating when federal pressure is applied.

“I have been disappointed in the President’s policies in the war against cocaine,” Van de Kamp said after the speech. “I hope he starts thinking of it as a federal problem.”

Van de Kamp said that Bennett, who will unveil the Bush Administration’s strategy in the drug war Sept. 5, should establish a Southern California drug task force such as the one created in Florida in 1982. He said the number of federal drug agents in the state should be doubled.

The federal Drug Enforcement Agency in Los Angeles County now has 83 agents, compared to 341 in Miami and 314 in New York, Van de Kamp said. Nearly half of all the cocaine coming into the country moves through California, according to the federal agency.

Van de Kamp also asked the federal government to cooperate in converting unused military property into desert prison camps for drug offenders.