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Buzzby

Law Enforcement: This Week's Corrupt Cops Stories
StopTheDrugWar | 03/31/2006

We've got a Texas twofer this week, as well as a horny DEA agent, a misguided magistrate, and, yes, another prison guard trying to supplement his income the wrong way. Let's get to it:

Drug money corrupts...

In Progreso, Texas, US Customs inspector Lizandro Martinez is behind bars awaiting an April sentencing date after pleading guilty to charges of money laundering and conspiracy to import more than two tons of marijuana. He made more than a million dollars in bribes in return for waving drug-laden trucks from Mexico through the border checkpoint he guarded, and more than 50 tons of drugs made it across the border thanks to Martinez, federal prosecutors said. Martinez and his wife drew attention with their conspicuous consumption and their use of cash to buy things like diamond earrings, diamond-studded Rolex watches, a used car dealership in downtown McAllen, and $77,000 worth of muscle cars. In 2003, federal investigators said, Martinez spent $400,000 in cash while drawing an inspector's salary of $55,000. He faces up to life in prison.

In San Antonio, former San Antonio police officer Enrique Hinojosa was sentenced to 2 ½ years in federal prison last Friday after pleading guilty last fall to aiding the distribution of cocaine. He was arrested by his colleagues during a 2003 raid on an apartment that netted cocaine, heroin, and $23,000 in cash. The apartment belonged to a childhood friend, and Hinojosa claimed he was simply visiting. But a witness told police Hinojosa had driven the friend to a heroin deal and that the friend had boasted he had a friend on the force who would warn him when police were cracking down in his neighborhood. In September, Hinojosa copped the plea. He also faces three years of supervised release.

In Richmond, Virginia, former DEA agent William Harden, 46, pleaded guilty Tuesday in federal court to lying to federal investigators about a sexual encounter with an informant. Prosecutors had alleged that Harden demanded oral sex from the informant in a Richmond-area motel room in July. The informant testified that she complied because she feared Harden, who said the sex was consensual. The woman later recorded a phone conversation with Harden in which he first denied the encounter, then tried to arrange a cover-up. He later confessed to investigators the encounter had occurred. He faces up to five years in prison when he is sentenced in July.

In Florence, South Carolina, Florence County Magistrate Rena White was arrested last Friday on official misconduct charges for taking drugs from a relative who faced criminal charges and a witness in the same case. The Florence County sheriff's office said White repeatedly used her position to win favorable treatment for the relative, and it has evidence from snitches who caught incriminating statements on tape. She was booked into the Florence County Detention Center, where she usually sets bond for defendants, and was released on personal recognizance.

In Folsom, California, Department of Corrections prison guard Wallace Samuel Lafitte was arrested last Friday on a complaint charging he offered to "sell, furnish and give away a controlled substance... to a person held in a state prison." He is also accused of bringing methamphetamine and marijuana into the California State Prison, Sacramento, also known as "New Folsom." During Lafitte's arraignment Monday, prosecutors told the court he had admitted selling meth and pot to inmates and being strung out on crack cocaine. Lafitte faces up to 10 years in prison on six charges. He is on administrative leave from the department and out on a personal recognizance bond pending a hearing next month.

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Toking Jedi

There is a reason that there is corruption in law enforcement. Prohibition of drugs just makes it extremely tempting for officials to get their hands on hundreds of thousands of dollars, simply by turning a blind eye and letting these drug deals go through. It doesn't make sense to me that the government, even when faced with infinite pieces of evidence for the ineffectiveness of prohibition and the drug war, doesn't react. It just continues to be as obstinate as a big fat baby saying, "NO! NO! NO!"

Oh yes, I said it: the government is a BIG FAT BABY.

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FreeUpJahCure

How were the feds able to keep tabs on a cash trail? I know with credit cards they can, but I never heard of them being able to with cash. Thats crazy!!

Buzzby

Forensic accountants do it all the time. The people from whom all these things were purchased keep records. For real estate, all transactions are public record. If they can't track down the seller, it's easy to calculate the value of the property held by the accused.

Smart criminals employ various means of hiding their ownership of things they can't afford with their legitimate incomes. Martinez seems to have been operating under the shaky theory that no one would notice his living like a millionaire on a cop's salary.

FreeUpJahCure

lol...yeah he definitly was not the smartest.

 

nacrypt

Another week, another bushel of bad apples!

Stupid people with a bad moral compass? Or, just regular people put in an environment of hightened personal power and extreme temptations caused by the existence of laws that are trying to push back against rather benign aspects of human nature?

I think the answer is clear.

troublemaker_42

Might be clear to you, but I'm going with the "stupid people with a bad moral compass" theory myself.....the thought that all those cash purchases would be unnoticed doesn't hint that, at least in that case, the person was overly intelligent, now does it?