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Police Blotter: All Police
May 19, 2008
Check out the police blotter for Thursday, May 15th. The bad guys are all cops.
PERP NUMBER l: NYPD Sergeant Jaime Katz. Katz was arrested for allegedly having sex with an 11-year-old boy.
Katz, president of the Gay Officers Action League in 2005, is an instructor at the Police Academy.
Katz was arrested on his way to work and charged with a criminal sex act and endangering the welfare of a child. He pleaded not guilty and is being held in lieu of $500,000 bail.
The boy is the adopted son of a relative.
Katz has been suspended from the department.
PERPS NUMBERS 2 and 3: Sgt. William Valerio and Det. Luis Batista. Sgt. Valerio of Internal Affairs was charged with lying to the FBI when questioned about his contacts with the allegedly dirty Det. Batista.
An indictment filed in Brooklyn Federal Court accuses Valerio, 41, a 16-year police veteran, of telling Batista — who is charged with conspiring to deal crack — how to evade surveillance.
Batista, 34, was arrested last summer for allegedly giving confidential information to a drug dealer. He was charged with conspiring to sell drugs and tipping off members of a drug crew.
Another NYPD sergeant, Henry Conde, had tipped off Batista in 2006 that he was under investigation for passing confidential information to a drug dealer. Conde was arrested last year for obstruction of justice and making false statements.
The feds were tapping Batista's phone when he called Valerio and said he was worried that Internal Affairs officers might be following him, according to the indictment.
Valerio is expected to surrender for arraignment Monday in Brooklyn federal court. He faces up to 30 years in prison if convicted.
CASE NUMBER 4: Inspector Michael Phipps. Phipps, who commands the Manhattan Housing Unit, forfeited 30 days pay after he used an NYPD vehicle for person use while off-duty.
He was also accused of abusing a city E-ZPass and department gas card to drive an unauthorized person.
CASE NUMBER 5: Deputy Inspector Joseph Hoch. Hoch was docked eight days pay for failing to properly investigate an incident at his Bronx stationhouse.
Hoch was the commanding officer of the 52nd precinct, where cops wrote the word “rat” on a sergeant’s locker. The sergeant had encouraged a suspect to file a complaint against cops who had roughed him up.
Instead of reporting the incident, Hoch had the cops involved clean the graffiti off the locker.
CASE NUMBERS 6 and 7: Names not yet made public. Two rookie Queens cops were under investigation for writing false tickets to increase their overtime pay.
The officers, assigned to the 113th precinct, wrote nearly 40 red light and seat belt summonses in one tour.
Their sergeant became suspicious when he realized the officers had submitted false overtime paperwork, claiming they had worked a full overtime tour when in fact they had worked less than a third of that tour.
The officers served 30-day suspensions without pay and are now on modified duty.
Internal Affairs is conducting a review of summons activity by other officers in the precinct, which covers part of South Jamaica, St. Albans, Hollis, and Springfield Gardens.
CASE NUMBER 8: Police Officer Eladro Mata. Mata, an off-duty cop, attacked a traffic agent for giving the cop’s girlfriend a ticket, then handcuffed the traffic agent.
The agent, Eric Celemi, said that Mata beat him bloody after he ticketed the double-parked car in the Bronx.
Mata was stripped of his badge and gun.
Another Night in Camelot. Former police department and current FBI spokesman John Miller was back in town, celebrating his 50th birthday party at — where else? — Elaine’s, the Upper East Side restaurant, made NYPD-friendly by Miller’s former boss, Bill Bratton.
Guests included Bratton’s former First Deputy John Timoney, now Miami’s police chief; Bratton staffers, including Brigid O’Connor Maple, the wife of the late Great One; former NYPD spokesmen Robert Nardoza and Tom Fahey; and FBI spokesmen, past and present, Joe Valiquette and Jim Margolin. [Bratton and wife Rikki Klieman were traveling in Italy.]
Although Miller spent only a year in the NYPD, his tour was memorable. Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani forced him to resign for either creating more favorable publicity for Bratton than the mayor himself received and/or for angering the mayor because of Miller’s relationship with Rudy’s press secretary/inamorata Cristyne Lategano.
Retired NYPD Captain Steve Davis served as Master of Ceremonies. He told how, during Miller’s FBI background check, Davis told Bureau agents that Miller would make the perfect FBI spokesman because he never returns phone calls.
An Open “Letter” to Deputy Mayor Ed Skyler.
“Dear Ed, “I am so glad that Mayor Mike realizes the importance of education. All New Yorkers should be thanking him for the city’s new advertising campaign to educate tourists about the social costs of counterfeit goods. “I am especially grateful for your ad that says, “When you buy counterfeit goods, you support child labor, drug trafficking, organized crime and even worse.” “I know you don’t want to say it out loud for fear of making tourists afraid to visit New York but we New Yorkers know what that means. As I recently said to Police Commissioner Ray Kelly after his seizure of Nike sneakers and handbags from a Queens warehouse, ‘Counterfeiters of high-end goods are as evil to me as terrorists are to you.’ “Or as the commissioner himself put it at a top-level counterfeiting seminar last year, terrorist cells are financed, at least in part, through sales of counterfeit Gucci and Prada handbags.” Sincerely, Valerie Salembier, |
