Sheriff real, unintentional star of 'Tulia' film

The slew of drug arrests in Tulia in 1999 set off a wave of legal wrangling and political action that turned the state's criminal justice establishment on its ear, and ultimately resulted in the pardoning of dozens of wrongfully convicted people and the dismantling of Texas 50+ Byrne-grant funded drug task forces.

Now, nearly a decade later, those ripples from the legal and political world are steadily filtering into the cultural milieu.

Yesterday afternoon I attended the premier of a new documentary - Tulia, Texas - which opened at the SXSW film festival. Tulia activist Freddie Brookins and his wife, parents of one of those wrongfully arrested, along with Nate Blakeslee, author of a book on the case, attended and answered questions afterward. The missus and I joined them and the filmmakers, Cassandra Herman and Kelly Whalen, afterward at Ruby's BBQ for a meal and a chat.

The hour-long film, which was funded through a public television grant and may wind up on PBS within the next year, featured more extensive interviews with undercover agent Tom Coleman and Sheriff Larry Stewart (the real star of the show) than have previously been available - Blakeslee told me he never got that kind of face time with Coleman in all his years covering the story, and I'm not sure anyone has. I've never heard the disgraced peace officer speak at such length except on the stand.

I say Sheriff Stewart was the star of the show, because his comments more than anyone made sense of the situation for outsiders - not because he explained it well, but because he epitomized the deep denial of any wrongdoing or wrong thinking shared by so many in Tulia. His statements seemed so oblivious to facts proven in both the courtroom and the extensive paper trail documentation, you almost felt sorry for the guy, who clearly was in way over his head.

Almost.

One's sympathy dried up, though, as evidence mounted through the film that Tom Coleman's statements repeatedly didn't match the facts (which resulted, ultimately, in his perjury conviction), and stories emerge of families losing loved ones for several years based on this man's uncorroborated word.

The film is visually gorgeous, and the filmmakers had been tracking the case since 2002, so they had lots of footage from the courtroom drama over the years. I attended several of the events and court hearing featured in the show, and found myself scanning the crowd scenes looking for (and finding) many familiar faces.

Attorney Jeff Blackburn similarly came off in the show as both a legal hero and quite a character, which if you know him is a pretty accurate portrayal. Jeff's a real piece of work, and it shows. Now that he's running the Innocence Project at Texas Tech, I'd guess this video should help significantly with his fundraising; I hope so, anyway.

Most coverage of what happened in Tulia falls along one of two paths - tracking the legal case, as this film and Nate's book do, or tracking the political process, which has dominated much of the MSM news coverage over the years. The piece that you didn't get from the film was that a large-scale, statewide movement developed around the case that passed several corrective laws and ultimately convinced the state to abolish Texas' drug task force system entirely.

It would be possible to view this film and think, "This is just a story about an aberration in a rural backwater, it doesn't happen anywhere else." But drug task forces nationwide operate on an essentially similar model to the one in Tulia. That's a point I wish the film more strongly emphasized, especially at a time when the Byrne grant program and drug task forces nationwide face major budget cuts. President Bush want to de-fund the task forces, which in some states are responsible for up to 85% of all drug arrests.

Indeed, the film only hinted at the odd, left-right coalition that worked together on the political end of the Tulia saga. A questioner after the show expressed surprise that Bill O'Reilly took up the Tulians cause, and the filmmakers were at a loss to explain why. But really, conservatives were as alarmed at this case as liberals. To me, that's one of the most important new developments from the whole episode.

Nationally, the Heritage Foundation and the National Taxpayers Union have been more active opposing drug task force funding than any liberal group. Then-House Criminal Jurisprudence Chairman Terry Keel (R) and Sen. Juan "Chuy" Hinojosa (D) spearheaded the relevant legislation that ultimately led to the task forces' demise in Texas and a requirement for corroborating evidence for testimony of undercover drug informants, while Gov. Perry's pardon placed his permanent imprimatur on the case.

Meanwhile, the Tulia episode taught organizations working at the capitol in Austin who'd previously been on opposite sides of the fence to work together for the first time, a development that contributed greatly to coalitions pursuing other criminal justice reforms like strengthening probation or expanding treatment capacity in the justice system.

All that to say, this film captured an important piece, but IMO not the full the legacy of the Tulia case, which in some ways has yet to fully play out. I've wondered if we may look back in a couple of decades and see Tulia as a major turning point for the criminal justice system, an event that permanently changed the terms of debate about America's war on drugs. I hope so.

BLOGVERSATION: See another early review from the Drug Law Blog. See also from Panhandle Truth Squad, a story about Jeff Blackburn demonstrating thta some men are born to greatness, and others have greatness "spilled upon them."