In 1999, a drug sting operation in the small town of Tulia, Texas resulted in the arrest of 46 people, 40 of who were black. The remaining six individuals were either latinos or whites dating blacks. The drug bust incarcerated almost 15% of the black population and has been denounced as a form of "racial profiling" by the NAACP and the ACLU. Those organizations filed a complaint with the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice and four years later, in 2003, the testimony of the key witness was deemed not credible and prosecutors agreed not to go to retrial.

All of the evidence presented against those arrested came from the uncorroborated testimony of Tom Coleman, a private informant hired by the Sheriff of Tulia to conduct the sting operation. Coleman supposedly sought to buy powder cocaine and other drugs from area residents. In choosing his sting targets, he used a list of 60 "known drug dealers" that the Sheriff had previously compiled during a racially motivated local drug scare. Agent Coleman worked alone and did not wear a wire during any of the alleged transactions.

Seven of those arrested were convicted and sentenced to prison terms, one for 99 years. Fourteen defendants took pleas and were sentenced to prison. Others were sentenced to probation. Most of the prison sentences were increased because the drugs were allegedly sold within 1000 feet of a school, yet most of the defendants lived in trailer parks miles away from the nearest school. Coleman neither remembers, nor has records of any of the exact locations of the individual drug transactions.

Slowly, as suspicions rose around the credibility of Coleman’s evidence, cracks began to show. For a lucky few, cases were dismissed - one defendant was cleared when his employer showed time cards proving he was at work at the time of the alleged buy; another defendant had bank records proving that she was out of state.

A trial was ordered to determine whether the defendants were convicted solely on the word of Coleman, and to investigate whether prosecutors had failed to turn over information from Coleman's background that may have cast doubt on his testimony. It was stipulated by all parties and approved by the court that Coleman was not a credible witness under oath and state district Judge Ron Chapman requested new trials for the defendants. Only hours later a special prosecutor vowed to dismiss the cases.

Although their cases are yet to be considered by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals - which could take up to two years - Gov. Rick Perry signed a bill in June, 2003 unanimously approved by the Texas House allowing the remaining 13 inmates to be freed on bond.

In Tulia and around the country, many individual activists, family members, lawyers and advocacy organizations worked tirelessly for the freedom of the wrongly accused. The William Moses Kunstler Fund for Racial Justice (see their video, Tulia, Texas: Scenes From the Drug War), the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the American Civil Liberties Union, in particular, were pivotal in leading the legal effort and expanding public pressure. The Drug Policy Alliance helped to initiate and support this coalition, and kept the media and the public focused on the unfolding scandal.

Although what happened in Tulia is particularly shocking, unfortunately, it is just one of the countless injustices in a war on drugs that disproportionately targets people of color.