NYPD detectives planted cocaine on innocent members of the public to avoid demotion

[nomix]

linky

We fabricated drug charges against innocent people to meet arrest quotas, former detective testifies

BY John Marzulli
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

A former NYPD narcotics detective snared in a corruption scandal testified it was common practice to fabricate drug charges against innocent people to meet arrest quotas.

The bombshell testimony from Stephen Anderson is the first public account of the twisted culture behind the false arrests in the Brooklyn South and Queens narc squads, which led to the arrests of eight cops and a massive shakeup.

Anderson, testifying under a cooperation agreement with prosecutors, was busted for planting cocaine, a practice known as "flaking," on four men in a Queens bar in 2008 to help out fellow cop Henry Tavarez, whose buy-and-bust activity had been low.

"Tavarez was ... was worried about getting sent back [to patrol] and, you know, the supervisors getting on his case," he recounted at the corruption trial of Brooklyn South narcotics Detective Jason Arbeeny.

"I had decided to give him [Tavarez] the drugs to help him out so that he could say he had a buy," Anderson testified last week in Brooklyn Supreme Court.

He made clear he wasn't about to pass off the two legit arrests he had made in the bar to Tavarez.

"As a detective, you still have a number to reach while you are in the narcotics division," he said.

NYPD officials did not respond to a request for comment.

Anderson worked in the Queens and Brooklyn South narcotics squads and was called to the stand at Arbeeny's bench trial to show the illegal conduct wasn't limited to a single squad.

"Did you observe with some frequency this ... practice which is taking someone who was seemingly not guilty of a crime and laying the drugs on them?" Justice Gustin Reichbach asked Anderson.

"Yes, multiple times," he replied.

The judge pressed Anderson on whether he ever gave a thought to the damage he was inflicting on the innocent.

"It was something I was seeing a lot of, whether it was from supervisors or undercovers and even investigators," he said.

"It's almost like you have no emotion with it, that they attach the bodies to it, they're going to be out of jail tomorrow anyway; nothing is going to happen to them anyway."

The city paid $300,000 to settle a false arrest suit by Jose Colon and his brother Maximo, who were falsely arrested by Anderson and Tavarez. A surveillance tape inside the bar showed they had been framed.

A federal judge presiding over the suit said the NYPD's plagued by "widespread falsification" by arresting officers.

First and foremost, someone needs to take a look at how many other people have been fucked over by the system. Secondly, there's good reason to rethink this war on drugs idiocy.

Thirdly, arrest quotas? That's stupid. That's like production quotas in the Soviet Union. If you were penalized for not producing enough toilet paper, you sent a report stating you made enough toilet paper. And tried to make up the difference by rebranding old news papers as toilet paper.

As we see, this has led to the same bloody idiocy in (some) NYPD drugs squads, as cops feel the need to lie too stay out of uniform. It's a disgrace, but the department invited it on themselves.

 

[remizak]

The war on drugs is nothing more than a massive waste of money and resources. Sadly ticket and arrest quotas are all to common even though the top brass says they don't exist and because of that it leads to innocent people getting fucked over by the people who should be protecting and serving them.

 

[narf]

Let's put a quota on firefighters. If you do not extinguish at least one burning house a day you get fired. Now get cracking arsoning.

 

[Gastronaut]

Let's put a quota on firefighters. If you do not extinguish at least one burning house a day you get fired. Now get cracking arsoning.

Yeah, leave the cracking to the police.

 

[GRtak]

The only thing the War on Drugs is good for: Breeding corruption.

 

[argatoga]

Crimes like this is why I believe we should resurrect crucifixion as a form of punishment.

 

[Cobol74]

Quotas - how does that work then?

"Well you find someone shabbily dressed and plant some drugs on them."

Home of the brave - land of the, err, banged up!

See that bit on QI about US gaols recently? Wow you guys need to get a grip, some people will do anything for money and I do not mean the incarcerated.

 

[tigger]

Crimes like this is why I believe we should resurrect crucifixion as a form of punishment.

Nah, just let the crooked cops serve out the combined remainder of the sentences of those they got locked up on false charges. See if they still think it's no big deal then.

 

[GRtak]

Quotas - how does that work then?

I dated a cop for a while and she could not tell me how the quotas worked because they would not tell the officers. The only time they knew was when they weren't doing "enough", and they got the speech.

 

[Cobol74]

The best form of man management then - good oh.