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EDITOR, As the father of three sons who have, during the last 20 years, been victims of the illegal drug-trafficking madness that has run rampant in the United States, I am appalled at what has happened in recent months to the very effective KIDS of El Paso family therapy program to correct drug-abuse problems. Charges, allegations and harassment, articulated primarily by an El Paso lawyer named ***, have been accepted and repeated ad nauseum by El Paso's two daily newspapers and three major network television news departments. These unsubstantiated charges by *** have also apparently been accepted as a basis for action by the staff of the Texas Commission on Alcohol and Drug Abuse (TCADA) and the office of the attorney general of the state of Texas. That *** is the primary and almost sole initial source of the allegations is evidenced by a TCADA staff telephone log, introduced as evidence in the recent Travis County court hearing, which reflected a continuous and extensive barrage of long-distance telephone communications between *** and the TCADA staff between September 1987 and May 1988. With all the evidence and witnesses in behalf of TCADA and KIDS of El Paso County presented in the Travis County court before a fair and impartial district judge, ***, *** ruled that there was no basis for an injunction against the KIDS program, after considering the allegations brought by the TCADA staff and the office of the attorney general. In my opinion, the KIDS of El Paso program and its involved clients and their parents are due an apology for the damages caused by these allegations, in terms of tens of thousands of dollars in defense costs and other very serious damage. These innocent parties have been working effectively and at great personal sacrifice to help save some of El Paso's most seriously drug-afflicted adolescent youths. The money and talent expended in fighting off these vicious attacks would have been much more constructively used to help more El Paso youths overcome their drug-abuse problems. - ***, El Paso.
