South Carolina’s top prosecutor said Wednesday he will start
using the power of the state grand jury to combat gang-related drug
activity statewide.
Attorney General Henry McMaster said the state grand jury — a
branch of his office — will be used to force gang members to testify
in drug investigations. That can help state and local law
enforcement agencies break up drug networks, he said.
Gangs typically are involved in drug trafficking, McMaster
said.
“It is clear we have a gang problem in South Carolina, and the
full resources of the state must be used to combat that,” he said
during a press conference at his Columbia office.
Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott, whom McMaster credited with
helping come up with the idea, said the goal is to identify drug
kingpins.
“If we cut the head off, the body will follow,” Lott said. “We’re
catching the little ones right now.”
But Denyse Williams, executive director of the state chapter of
the American Civil Liberties Union, said she is concerned the state
grand jury will be used to unfairly target poor minorities who are
not the “big movers and shakers in the drug trade.”
“They’re dealing with powerless people who don’t know their legal
rights,” she said Wednesday.
The state grand jury is not all-powerful: Witnesses cannot be
jailed for contempt if they refused to testify while invoking their
Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. “Without a
concrete deal of immunity, they should take the Fifth on every
single question,” Williams said.
Although there is “no silver bullet to this problem,” the state
grand jury can be a useful tool in combatting gangs, State Law
Enforcement Division Chief Robert Stewart said during the press
conference.
Between 80 and 100 gangs have been identified statewide using a
federal definition of gangs, Stewart said. There were 522 reported
gang-related incidents statewide last year, up from 370 the previous
year, he said, though he added the state doesn’t yet track the
number of gang-related drug incidents.
McMaster said gang activity cuts across all racial and income
levels. David Soto, a Richland sheriff’s gang investigator, showed
reporters pictures of gang graffiti in the county, including upscale
areas of Northeast Richland.
The state grand jury is more powerful than county grand juries,
which don’t have subpoena powers and are limited to crimes within
their respective counties. The state grand jury can investigate
multicounty drug and obscenity crimes, as well as public corruption,
election fraud, computer crime violations, securities fraud and
terrorism.
Besides compelling witnesses to testify, the 18-member state
grand jury, which meets in secret, can subpoena records and other
documents in deciding whether to issue indictments.
Since becoming the state attorney general two years ago,
McMaster, a former U.S. attorney for South Carolina, has sought the
Legislature’s approval to expand the state grand jury’s authority.
His latest proposal would not require any change in the law.
State Sen. Jake Knotts, R-Lexington, who spoke during Wednesday’s
press conference, has prefiled a bill that would define a gang and
would make it illegal for gang members to intimidate someone into
joining a gang or to keep someone from leaving a gang.
Reach Brundrett at (803) 771-8484 or rbrundrett@thestate.com.
