District Attorney Craig Watkins' office wants a Porsche. They just won't say why.
"I can't ... give you a comment for the article," Watkins' spokesperson Debbie Denmon said when asked about item No. 15 on tomorrow's Dallas County Commissioners Court agenda:
Authorizing the acceptance of a 2001 Porsche Boxter for use by Investigators in the District Attorney's Office
Disclosing how the 12-year-old sports car, which belonged to a convicted steroids dealer, might be put to use might jeopardize future criminal investigations, Denmon suggested. So let's go back to the tape.
In September 2011, Watkins himself appeared before commissioners to plead for the use of 2001 Porsche Boxter seized from a drug dealer only to run straight into Republican Maurine Dickey. (We don't have the VINs, but let's assume for argument's sake this is the same vehicle being discussed tomorrow)
"We shouldn't drive it ... we need to put it up for auction and that money needs to go into the general fund," Dickey said said, channeling both her innate fiscal conservatism and her hatred of Dallas County's Democratic machine.
Dickey's thrust was parried by first assistant District Attorney Heath Harris who "stormed up to the podium" and accused her of putting investigators' lives at risk.
"When comments like these are made, now we can't use them. And you put our officers in danger when you do that," he told Dickey. "When you make those kinds of comments, you, you, you divulge that type of information ... our chief investigators are on the scene today that use these various different vehicles that we use and do our job. But now, those vehicles cannot be used."
Those same concerns no doubt influence Denmon's reluctance to talk about the current request. Once news that the District Attorney's Office has a 2001 Porsche Boxter gets out on Unfair Park, the entire criminal underworld will have their eyes peeled. Whoops.
