Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, March 22, 1990                   TAG: 9003222030
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B6   EDITION: STATE 
SOURCE: By Associated Press
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

PROSECUTOR, JUDGE QUARREL/ WISE COUNTY NEWS RELEASES SAID TO CONTAIN SLANTED

McAfee said Tuesday that the releases, all written within the last year and all regarding drug cases, are fair and accurate. He also denied they contained any specific criticism of court opinions offered by Circuit Judge J. Robert Stump.

McAfee's comments were in response to a letter Stump wrote three newspapers suggesting ways the media might better cover the courts. In the March 9 letter, which Stump began by stating was "not for publication," he said McAfee's releases "included half-truths; slanted views of the facts; and unwarranted verbal attacks on this court's opinions."

Stump's letter was submitted to the Bristol Herald Courier, Kingsport Times-News and the Coalfield Progress in Norton, in addition to being sent to McAfee.

The letter was written three days after McAfee's most recent news release, which suggested Stump gave an admitted distributor of the drug LSD a "slap on the hand" by sentencing him to six months in prison and placing him in the Community Diversion Incentive program. The prosecution had asked that the defendant be forced to serve the entire eight-year sentence imposed when he pleaded guilty Jan. 16.

"I can assure you that everything in that press release, which is apparently the straw that broke the camel's back, is very accurate," McAfee said. "Why the judge did what he did, I don't know."

The release states that William Darrell Long was placed in the CDI program over the unanimous objections of community Corrections Board members. The release says the board did not want Long in the program because of his "persistent offense record . . . his past unsatisfactory participation in the program" and the nature of the offense.

The release failed to note, however, that Long had only misdemeanor offenses on his record and this was his first felony conviction. It also failed to note that Long had a good participation record in the program until he was jailed by Stump on the drug distribution charge, a fact Stump outlined in the sentencing hearing.

An earlier news release also contained implied criticisms of Stump for dismissing the case against a man suspected of possessing and conspiring to distribute marijuana. The case, and apparently the state's most convincing evidence, centered on a confession reportedly given to a police officer by a co-defendant in the case.

In the news release, McAfee says Stump refused to allow the police officer to recite the confession to the jury and later dismissed the case because of the lack of evidence. McAfee failed to note, however, that by court rules the confession is considered hearsay evidence and is not allowed as evidence if the defendant is available to testify.

The first McAfee news release, dated June 13, 1989, said many drug-related cases were being moved into the federal court system in part because Wise County courts "had been suspending a substantial portion of the sentence imposed by the jury."

"I don't expect the judge to be a `yes man' for the commonwealth," McAfee said. "It wouldn't be right for us to even consider that. Our office has a strong difference of opinion in the way certain sentences are handed down in certain drug cases."

Stump said Tuesday that he had no further comment on his accusations against McAfee.