Lying NYPD Officers Cost Prosecutors Sixty More Criminal Convictions
from the propping-up-the-Drug-War-with-bogus-busts dept
Fighting crimes is easier when it's not being done by criminals. A bunch of cases are being tossed in New York City because misbehaving NYPD officers left their dirty handprints all over them.
Queens County District Attorney Melinda Katz is asking a state supreme court judge to vacate the cases of 60 people which their cases were based on the police work of three former NYPD detectives who were later convicted of various crimes.
This adds to the NYPD's list of self-inflicted wounds. Earlier this year, prosecutors tossed nearly 100 cases tainted by the presence of narcotics detective Joseph Franco. Franco was charged with 26 criminal counts -- including perjury and official misconduct -- in 2019. The dismissals followed another investigation which showed Franco had lied about drug buys to secure warrants and perform arrests. Some arrestees were able to get their cases dismissed by obtaining security camera footage showing alleged drug purchases had never occurred.
One lying cop and nearly 100 dismissals. Now this: three bad cops and 60 dismissals. And these cops have some pretty impressive rap sheets.
Former NYPD Detective Kevin Desormeau was convicted of perjury after lying about witnessing a drug sale that videotaped evidence showed did not take place. He also pleaded guilty after he fabricated the facts of a gun possession arrest. Desormeau was terminated by the NYPD and there are 34 cases the district attorney says should be dismissed based on his role as the essential witness.
Former NYPD Detective Sasha Cordoba pled guilty in Manhattan to perjury relating to her fabricating the facts of a gun possession arrest. Cordoba was terminated by the NYPD. 20 cases will be requested to be dismissed based on Cordoba’s role as the essential witness.
The third cop involved in these dismissals at least wasn't in the perjury business. No, he was into darker stuff.
As alleged in court filings by the government, in February 2008, Sandino arrested a woman identified in the Information as Jane Doe 1 (“the victim”) and her boyfriend on drug distribution charges following the execution of a search warrant at their apartment. During the arrest, Sandino forced the victim to undress in front of him in the bedroom of the apartment. Later, at the precinct, Sandino told the victim that she was going to jail and would lose her children unless she had sex with him. When the victim went to the restroom at the precinct, Sandino followed her inside and made her perform oral sex. Upon the victim’s release from custody, Sandino told her that he expected her to have sex with him at a later time. Thereafter, Sandino called the victim on numerous occasions. The victim subsequently reported Sandino’s misconduct to NYPD’s Internal Affairs Bureau, which began an investigation. In March 2008, Sandino was removed from active duty.
As further alleged in the government’s court filings, Sandino engaged in similar misconduct in the summer of 2006 in connection with the arrest of another drug dealer. On that occasion, Sandino coerced a female cousin of the drug dealer, identified in the Information as Jane Doe 2, to engage in sex acts with him based on threats he made concerning the lengthy prison sentence faced by the drug dealer.
More recently, in September 2009, Sandino allegedly engaged in lewd sexual behavior in front of a female arrestee and then forced her to raise her shirt to expose her upper body.
Sandino was fired by the NYPD in 2011, one year after he racked up this federal indictment. Somehow, he's still involved with six convictions now being tossed out because of his role as a witness. That means six people have spent a long time in jail due to this bad cop's testimony that was apparently given more than a decade ago.
It's good to see all three cops are listed as "former." But it is concerning that someone like Sandino managed to remain a law enforcement officer for thirteen years when it was likely apparent long before his indictment that he was abusing his power. Meanwhile, Detective Desormeau's misconduct has affected cases dating as far back as 2014, which potentially means someone lost most of a decade as the result of a bad cop's statements in court.
The repeal of a state law that effectively denied access to police misconduct records for decades means those overseeing the NYPD -- which includes city prosecutors that frequently rely on their testimony -- can no longer effectively pretend the department isn't home to a number of bad apples. Expect more of this in the near future as this long-delayed transparency forces city officials and, hopefully, the NYPD itself, to take officer misconduct more seriously. But while we wait for a police accountability ideal that may never arrive, we can at least take some satisfaction in these reversals of unjustly obtained criminal court "wins."
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Filed Under: lying, lying police, nypd
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I await for the union to get these poor officers back on the job with back pay because obviously this was all just a setup to make all cops look bad & is no way indicative of exactly how corrupt those few bad apples are allowed to become because protecting the image of cops matters more than innocents in jail & sexual predators with a badge preying on citizens.
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a few bad apples
The expression is "one bad apple spoils the whole barrel". It's not "there's one in every bunch", as media reports seem to assume.
One is too many.
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It didn't really "cost" criminal convictions (although, given the attitude of many prosecutors, i suppose "cost" is a reasonable term in that context), at least not all of them, if the cases were bad to begin with. Maybe some of the defendants were actually guilty of some charge, but it sounds like loads of stuff was straight-up fabricated.
There certainly was a cost for the wrongly prosecuted, the convicted, the victims of these cops' other behaviors, and families.
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When you have a system that actively protects those who hold the reins of power and takes their word as gospel truth, this sort of abuse was inevitable. Realistically, what sort of punishment even awaits a lying officer? Are their pensions repealed? Are there significant penalties of fines or jail time? Or are they more likely than not shuffled back into the revolving door of police departments in hopes that the controversy blows over, during which the rhetoric around protecting the thin blue line is trumpeted even louder than ever?
Cops are like CEOs - they're given plenty of protection on the basis of the perceived risk they experience at their job. In reality this means that they get away with everything they want to and their truly egregious, contemptuous behavior rarely ever merits anything harsher than a wrist slap, while their victims are usually irreparably fucked over.
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Anyone that becomes a victim of an actual criminal released because of the actions of these officers should sue them.
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Re:
Not just the ones released - some of these people who were convicted may well have actually been innocent, which means that the actual culprit may have been running around committing other crimes while the innocent guy was locked up.
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Re:
"It didn't really "cost" criminal convictions (although, given the attitude of many prosecutors, i suppose "cost" is a reasonable term in that context), at least not all of them, if the cases were bad to begin with."
It is, frankly, terrifying to consider that there may be a lot of people out there who will assume that all of said cases are valid and now a great many bad guys will be walking the streets because the bleeding-heart liberal prosecutors saw fit not to give some understanding to the brave cops going above and beyond their duty to "help" out a difficult case.
Rather than a pair of perjurers and a serial rapist with badges trying to meet their arrest quota by smearing dirt on anyone they thought it could stick to.
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New defense?
Right now cops get a lot of trust from the legal system. However, if this keeps going on:
"Well, your honor, I understand it is his word against mine. I am, however, an upstanding citizen with no prior arrests. The witness for the prosecution though is...a cop. The defense rests."
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Re: Re:
For drug-related crimes, most arrests are fungible in that they are not the outcome of an investigation that has started separately from the arrest and ended with it.
So the "the real perpetrator is still on the loose" bogeyman does not really apply. Still, the time police gets paid for would be better invested in investigating rather than inventing crimes.
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I'm surprised the sexual predator got arrested. Cops have pressured women into sex since its beginning. The investigation did take a long time though. Did other cops hear about it and wanted in on the action so they delayed investigation?
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Re: New defense?
Cops get too much trust. All people lie hence cops do so as often if not more so due to incentives like promotions and circle jerking. Cops have certain personality types, think bullies. These types are more likely to lie and abuse the power their job gives them. Which is also why they protect and lie for each other. So they themselves will be saved when they commit a crime and they will eventually commit a crime. "One hand washes another".
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