Posted on 07/25/2008 8:49:03 PM PDT by bamahead
After being caught twice with a "baggie" of marijuana, 23-year old Rachel Hoffman was reportedly told by police in Tallahassee, Florida that she would go to prison for four years unless she became an undercover informant.
The young woman, a recent graduate of Florida State University, was murdered during a botched sting operation two months ago.
"The idea of waging a war on drugs is to protect people and here it seems like we're putting people in harm's way," said Lance Block, a lawyer hired by Rachel's parents.
The Florida Attorney General's office says it is reviewing the procedures and protocol of the Tallahassee police.
"I'm calling her a criminal," Tallahassee police chief Dennis Jones told 20/20, who maintains that both drug dealers and drug users are considered criminals to his department.
Under Florida law, possession of more than 20 grams of marijuana is a felony.
The Tallahassee police chief says Rachel was suspected of selling drugs and she was rightly treated as a criminal.
"That's my job as a police chief to find these criminals in our community and take them off the street, to make the proper arrests," Jones told 20/20.
Rachel's case also is raising questions about how police recruit and use informants in undercover operations.
"There need to be some safeguards here," said Block, the Hoffman family lawyer.
The young woman received no training before being sent to an undercover meeting to buy a large amount of drugs and a handgun from two suspects.
Police says Rachel was killed by the very handgun she was supposed to buy.
"I don't think she understood the risk or danger that she was in," said Block.
Rachel was in a drug court diversion program when she became an informant.
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
They lied to Rachel Hoffman; they threatened her with a prison sentence for mere possession, which she never would have seen one day in prison for the crime of possession of a baggie of marijuana.
if she had been given her constitutional right to speak with an attorney, she would be alive today, and be looking at maybe 6 months probation.
Instead, she's dead, and buried...and people with half a brain recognize that fact as a travesty, and abuse of power by the authorities who put her in that situation.
Offering a deal to a drug dealer.
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