Poison Pills End Drama in Courtroom : Justice: Informant swallows fatal dose of cyanide after being convicted of drug crime that would have put him in prison for 25 years.

By ALAN ABRAHAMSON

Dec. 5, 1991 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

In a suicide scene that rocked the austere San Diego federal court, a 53-year-old Pacific Beach man swallowed cyanide pills seconds after he heard a jury convict him Wednesday of drug crimes that would have landed him behind bars for at least 25 years.

Donald Wayne Shantos, an informant who suddenly found himself accused and who had turned down a plea bargain that would have meant only five years in prison, took the cyanide about 11 a.m., moments after a jury convicted him of possessing methamphetamine and of conspiracy, witnesses and federal marshals said.

While the jury was asked to confirm its verdict, Shantos, sitting at the defense table, slid the pills to his mouth from a glass vial he had in his pocket, began gurgling, then slithered to the carpeted floor, witnesses and marshals said. Jurors looked on in horror, “some of the women tearful and the men obviously shaken,” U.S. Marshal Richard Cameron said.

A note Shantos had written indicated he had taken massive amounts of cyanide, officials said. He died seven hours later at Mercy Hospital, hospital spokesman Michael Scahill said.

Officials also said the note went on to say that Shantos violently feared prison--either the retribution for being an informant or the isolation that comes with being protected from other inmates by well-meaning prison officials.

Under rigid new federal sentencing guidelines, Shantos would have drawn 25 to 30 years in federal prison, said his San Diego attorney, Craig Weinerman. The guidelines, though upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, have drawn intense criticism as arbitrary and harsh.

“Being 54 years old, you don’t need to be a math wizard to figure out that you’re going to spend the rest of your life in prison,” Weinerman said. “He never could come to grips with a system that would want to put him in prison for such a long period of time and cut loose the people he informed on.

“I think you saw a certain hypocrisy revealed in the system,” Weinerman said. “He was making a statement, as crazy as it is, that this is unfair, unjust and not right.”

The prosecutor in the case, Assistant U.S. Atty. Bruce Smith, declined to comment.

“All I can say is, it’s a case where an informant went bad,” U.S. Atty. William Braniff said.

“When that became apparent to the DEA,” the Drug Enforcement Administration, “they unhesitatingly pursued the prosecution against him,” Braniff said. “We followed through in trial. He received a fair trial, and the jury was convinced of his guilt.

“It’s unfortunate,” Braniff said, “that he ended it the way he did.”

Shantos acted as an on-again, off-again informant for the DEA from 1987 through 1990, helping put at least five people in prison, Weinerman said.

In late 1989, DEA agents suspected Shantos was not only tipping them off but trying to sell meth himself, Weinerman said.

After a three-month probe, he was arrested Feb. 9, 1990, after accepting delivery of about 5 pounds of meth from a Lakeside man he had been informing on, Weinerman said.

Shantos, the lawyer said, believed he was working only for the DEA and intended to turn over the meth to agents. He also claimed he had been threatened by DEA agents into confessing and passed a lie detector test, but that evidence was not allowed at the trial because lie detector results are not considered legally reliable, Weinerman said.

“At the trial, this is a man who believed he was screwed by DEA and believed he did nothing wrong,” Weinerman said.

Citing fear of prison for any length of time, Shantos turned down the pretrial plea bargain, Weinerman said. The trial ran for eight days over the past month, and, after a day of deliberation, the jury came back Wednesday morning with its verdict--guilty.

Shantos had remained free on $150,000 bail. He suffered from depression and took prescription medicine for his condition, Weinerman said. The vial containing the pills appeared to be a prescription bottle, officials said.

It remained unclear Wednesday where Shantos obtained cyanide, officials said. An autopsy is set for today, the county medical examiner’s office said.

Weinerman said late Wednesday night that he was “just kind of numb.”

“In my professional performance, and just as a human being, I always try to be honest with my clients, tell them which way the wind is blowing,” he said. “I told this guy which way the wind was blowing. And he decided that he was going to do away with himself.

“If I had it to do over again, knowing what I know now, and I’m not a theological type, I would have had a long talk, to try to convince him there was still hope,” Weinerman said. “I wish I would have done that.”