South Carolina Drug Crime Lawyers

An NYPD detective was found guilty of official misconduct yesterday for planting drugs on two defendants.  Charges included offering a false instrument for filing and falsifying business records.

During the trial, a former detective testified that officers in the narcotics units often planted drugs on innocent people – that detective has already pled guilty to official misconduct for engaging in the same criminal activity.

Before announcing the verdict, Judge Reichbach scolded the department for what he described as a widespread culture of corruption embedded in its drug units.

“I thought I was not naïve,” he said. “But even this court was shocked, not only by the seeming pervasive scope of misconduct but even more distressingly by the seeming casualness by which such conduct is employed.”

The case against the Detective was a part of  large tale of corruption in Police Department drug units: several narcotics officers in Brooklyn have been caught mishandling drugs they seized as evidence, and hundreds of tainted drug cases have been dismissed. The city has made several payments to settle civil suits over wrongful incarcerations related to the activity.

By: South Carolina Drug Crime Lawyer Pete Strom