Weekly:
This
Week's
Corrupt
Cops
Stories
4/22/05
More jail guards gone bad, a Border Patrol agent pleads guilty, a former Puerto Rican cop gets busted in a Florida heroin dragnet, and New York City police take preemptive steps to stop corruption before it starts. But before we get to it, we should note a couple of important things. First, some of these reports are of arrests only -- not convictions -- and the accused deserve and should be accorded the presumption of innocence. Second, we do not glory in seeing police officers being severely punished for drug offenses. The case of the Pennsylvania jail guard who faces 25 years in prison for trying to smuggle what was apparently a small amount of marijuana into the jail is a perfect example of prosecutorial overkill. We don't like to see that happen to anybody. All right, now let's get to it: In Santa Fe, New Mexico, county jail guard Amos Romero, 43, was arrested Sunday after being caught in a sting where he took money from an undercover officer to deliver what he thought was cocaine to a jail inmate, the Albuquerque Journal reported. Romero was arraigned Tuesday on two counts of conspiracy to traffic cocaine into the jail and remains in jail on two $100,000 cash-only bonds. The sting began early this month when a local narcotics task force heard from a jail inmate it called a "reliable source" that Romero conducted "many narcotics transactions with inmates," for between $150 and $300 per delivery. On April 6, Romero was stung, agreeing to take 3.1 grams of fake cocaine and $150 from a woman working with the task force. (Romero is apparently not only a crook but a cheat; he only delivered 1.9 grams of the fake coke.) On April 17, he was stung again and arrested while in uniform after making another surveilled transaction. In Sunbury, Pennsylvania, another jail guard is in trouble. Northumberland County District Attorney Tony Rosini announced Wednesday that guard Jeremy Bowersox, who worked at the Northumberland County Prison, has been arrested for trying to smuggle marijuana into the prison. He is charged with possession of a controlled substance, criminal attempt to deliver a controlled substance, criminal use of a communication facility, and bribery -- all felonies -- as well as misdemeanor possession of marijuana and possession with intent to use drug paraphernalia. He faces up to 25 years in prison. He went down as a result of an undercover operation by the Northumberland-Montour Drug Task Force. In Orlando, an unnamed former Puerto Rican police officer was one of 15 people arrested by Central Florida drug agents taking down a heroin sales ring. Operation Dirty Dancing rolled up users and dealers in a series of raids last week. Investigators told WFTV in Orlando that the unnamed Puerto Rican former cop was one of the dealers. In San Diego, former Border Patrol Agent Luis Higareda, 31, who was caught with 750 pounds of pot in his patrol vehicle in Imperial County has pleaded guilty in federal court to drug smuggling, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported April 15. Higareda is being held without bail and faces a mandatory minimum five-year sentence. That sentence will be handed down July 5. Higareda was observed by his coworkers loading duffel bags full of marijuana into his vehicle after meeting unknown people coming from Mexico. He led Border Patrol agents on a 20-mile chase before stopping and being arrested. In New York City, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly is taking preemptive steps to crack down on what he called a "cowboy culture" among narcotics detectives in the NYPD. The move comes after a special integrity committee set up by Kelly found "a climate of loose supervision" in the Organized Crime Control Bureau, which oversees drugs, as well as vice and auto crime, the New York Daily News reported. The bureau saw standards slip as it expanded from 1,500 cops to more than 4,300 in recent years, and the result "was a significant infusion of unqualified, inexperienced personnel who lacked the dedication and drive essential to a highly specialized unit," said the report. The review recommended changes to tighten controls over the bureau, including stricter oversight of snitches, an increase in the number of unannounced inspections and random monitoring of officers to ensure they show up in court. With cash seizures last year of more than $23 million, the potential for corruption exists, the review warned.
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