In Nashville, Tenn., Willie Jones has no doubt that police still use a profile based on race.
Jones, owner of a landscaping service, thought the ticket agent at the American Airlines counter in Nashville Metro Airport reacted strangely when he paid cash Feb. 27 for his round-trip ticket to Houston.
``She said no one ever paid in cash anymore and she'd have to go in the back and check on what to do,'' Jones says.
What Jones didn't know is that in Nashville -- as in other airports -- many airport employees double as paid informers for the police.
The Drug Enforcement Administration usually pays them 10 percent of any money seized, says Capt. Judy Bawcum, head of the Nashville police division that runs the airport unit.
Jones got his ticket. Ten minutes later, as he waited for his plane, two drug team members stopped him.
``They flashed their badges and asked if I was carrying drugs or a large amount of money. I told them I didn't have anything to do with drugs, but I had money on me to go buy some plants for my business,'' Jones says.
They searched his overnight bag and found nothing. They patted him down and felt a bulge. Jones pulled out a black plastic wallet hidden under his shirt. It held $9,600.
``I explained that I was going to Houston to order some shrubbery for my nursery. I do it twice a year and pay cash because that's the way the growers want it,'' says the father of three girls.
The drug agents took his money.
``They said I was going to buy drugs with it, that their dog sniffed it and said it had drugs on it,'' Jones says. He never saw the dog.
NOTE: Even the government estimates that 92% of all money in circulation is tainted with traces of Cocaine due to contamination of counting machines at the Federal Reserve. -- jimpeel
The officers didn't arrest Jones, but they kept the money. They wrote, ``Unspecified amount of U.S. currency.''
Jones says losing the money almost put him out of business.
``That was to buy my stock. I'm known for having a good selection of unusual plants. That's why I go South twice a year to buy them. Now I've got to do it piecemeal, run out after I'm paid for a job and buy plants for the next one,'' he says.
Jones has receipts for three years showing that each fall and spring he buys plants from nurseries in other states.
``I just don't understand the government. I don't smoke. I don't drink. I don't wear gold chains and jewelry, and I don't get into trouble with the police,'' he says. ``I didn't know it was against the law for a 42-year-old black man to have money in his pocket.''
Tennessee police records confirm that the only charge ever filed a was for drag racing 15 years ago.
``DEA says I have to pay $900, 10 percent of the money they took from me, just to have the right to try to get it back,'' Jones says.
NOTE:While it was true at the time of this incident -- that a person whose property had been seized must put up a cash bond of 10% of the value of the goods seized prior to a hearing -- that portion of the law has since been repealed. -- jimpeel
His lawyer, E.E. ``Bo'' Edwards filled out government forms documenting that his client couldn't afford the $900 bond.
``If I'm going to feed my children, I need my truck, and the only way I can get that $900 is to sell it,'' Jones says.
It's been more than five months, and the only thing Jones has received from DEA are letters saying that his application to proceed without paying the $900 bond was deficient. ``But they never told us what those deficiencies were,'' says Edwards.
Jones is nearly resigned to losing the money. ``I don't think I'll ever get it back. But I think the only reason they thought I was a drug dealer was because I'm black, and that bothers me.''
It also bothers his lawyer.
``Of course he was stopped because he was black. No cop in his right mind would try that with a white businessman. These seizure laws give law enforcement a license to hunt, and the target of choice for many cops is those they believe are least cable of protecting themselves: blacks, Hispanics and poor whites,'' Edwards says.
.