JUDGE DOESN'T BUY DRUG DEALER CLAIM OF POSTWAR STRESS

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

DATE: WEDNESDAY, January 20, 1993                   TAG: 9301200168
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: DOUGLAS PARDUE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium
JUDGE DOESN'T BUY DRUG DEALER CLAIM OF POSTWAR STRESS
A federal judge in Roanoke ruled Tuesday that a life prison sentence is not cruel and unusual punishment for a Franklin County drug dealer who blamed a life of crime on the government for sending him to war in Vietnam.
U.S. District Judge Samuel Wilson said evidence showed that Warren "Mickey" Cooper was involved in anti-social behavior before he went to Vietnam in February 1970, and it continued when he got out of the military.
Cooper, 41, didn't testify at the hearing, but his attorney, David Walker, argued that Cooper couldn't stop his life of drug crimes because he was never treated for Vietnam War-induced post-traumatic stress disorder.
It wasn't until the past few weeks that Cooper even found out he had the disorder, which can be brought on by the horrors of war or sudden disaster. He was diagnosed with the disorder by Avrum Weiss, an Atlanta psychiatrist and Veterans Affairs consultant who is considered an expert on the disorder.
Weiss testified that the disorder caused Cooper to have an impaired view of reality and an inability to make proper judgments. If Cooper had been properly treated, Weiss said, "he likely would not be in the trouble he's in now."
According to Weiss, Cooper got the disorder as a result of horrible things he saw or participated in while he was a 19-year-old corporal in Vietnam. Under questioning by Assistant U.S. Attorney Joe Mott, Weiss conceded that he had not verified Cooper's accounts of what he experienced. But, Weiss said, he believes Cooper and suspects there were worse incidents that Cooper did not reveal.
Cooper told him of seeing fellow Marines murder children by forcing them into suspected booby traps. And, Weiss said, Cooper claimed that he became addicted to drugs after commanding officers gave him stimulants to keep him awake while on night "ambush" patrols.
Weiss said studies indicate that hundreds of thousands of Vietnam War veterans suffer some degree of post-traumatic stress disorder. And, he said, records show that 26 percent of those in combat have been arrested for some crime since returning.
While Wilson conceded that Cooper may be suffering from the long-untreated disorder, he said he saw nothing to indicate that Cooper did not understand the difference between right and wrong. And Wilson said he saw nothing to indicate that Cooper wasn't capable of stopping his drug trafficking.
Running a drug operation is not the same as a sudden outburst of violence, Wilson said.
Wilson sentenced Cooper to life with no parole, under federal sentencing guidelines that make a life sentence mandatory because Cooper had two prior drug convictions, one in 1974 and one in 1979.
Cooper's attorney had urged Wilson to discount the prior convictions because of Cooper's delayed-stress disorder. Had Wilson done so, Cooper still would have had to serve a sentence of about 24 to 30 years.
Cooper was convicted in October of running a drug distribution ring in Franklin and Henry counties. Mott said investigators believe the operation brought in more than 1 kilogram of cocaine a month from 1985 until early last year when Cooper, who ran a small country store in Endicott, was indicted with nine others.
Three of those charged were acquitted. Four, including Cooper's wife, Rhonda Kaye Cooper, have been convicted and sentenced to terms ranging from one year to nearly 22 years.
The man alleged to be the supplier, George D. Browning of Durham, N.C., is still being sought.

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB