"Who's going to believe a crackhead over a cop?"
- OFR -
By MIKE GOODWIN
Gazette Reporter
SCHENECTADY - Michael J. Siler never took a dinner break.
Instead, he would head to Hamilton Hill and pump his confidential
informants for information while
his partner, Richard E. Barnett, was home eating dinner with his wife.
By the time Barnett returned,
Siler had all the tips the two city officers needed for a night of crime
fighting.
"How do you do it?" Barnett once asked. "How do you get your information
from your CIs?"
"I throw them a few bumps [of crack cocaine] here and there if they tell
me something good," Siler
answered.
Incredulous, Barnett told Siler he thought he was crazy and warned him
not to get caught.
Siler's response: "Who's going to believe a crackhead over a cop?"
That exchange is included in hundreds of pages of previously sealed
legal documents the FBI and
the U.S Attorney's Office compiled during a two-year investigation of
the city Police Department.
U.S. District Court Judge David N. Hurd unsealed the documents on
Thursday at the request of
The Daily Gazette and the Times Union.
The legal papers outline the Justice Department's case against Siler,
detailing how they said Siler and
other officers maintained a network of women as street informants, many
of them drug-addicted
prostitutes, by feeding them a steady supply of crack and other drugs.
"It's really disturbing," Assistant U.S. Attorney John M. Katko said
Thursday. "All the conduct is."
Siler pleaded guilty on Monday to charges of racketeering, extortion,
drug distribution and drug
possession, admitting that he and other officers gave informants drugs
for information about criminal
activities in the city's low-income Hamilton Hill neighborhood.
Siler admitted he and Barnett shook down a drug dealer on Aug. 3, 1999,
and gave crack they
confiscated to Siler's informant. He also admitted ownership of 13.7
grams of marijuana, a quarter
gram of crack and 0.063 grams of heroin that was discovered during an
Aug. 19, 1999, police
search of his station house locker.
The FBI has been investigating the Police Department for two years.
The street informants eventually cooperated with the probe, providing
statements that said Siler and
his former supervisor, Lt. Michael J. Hamilton Jr., supplied them with
drugs. Often, the women told
authorities, they would lean into the officers' squad cars and receive
drugs.
One woman, Charmaine Ferrell, told authorities that Siler gave her crack
as often as three times a
day.
Another woman, Seba Richards, said, "Officer Siler has given me drugs in
the past, sometimes in
return for information on drug dealers and sometimes just because I
asked him." Her comments
were in an Aug. 18, 1999, statement to Schenectady Assistant Police
Chief William Grasso.
Some of the informants also said they saw Siler smoke marijuana and that
he kept a stash of the
drug in his apartment.
Siler, Hamilton and other officers also warned their informants when
they were being investigated by
other police officers, and they tipped them off to upcoming police raids
and arrests, according to
documents filed by the U.S. Attorney's Office.
Three of the women said Siler traded crack for sex with them.
Siler's attorney, Michael L. Koenig, declined to comment Thursday.
Joseph Tacopina, Hamilton's attorney, said the accusations against his
client are untrue and the
government's witnesses would wither under cross examination.
Federal prosecutors said that once the FBI and ranking members of the
Police Department began
investigating the operation, Siler and Hamilton conspired to influence
the testimony of subpoenaed
grand jury witnesses. The FBI intercepted cellphone conversations that
prosecutors said show
Hamilton tried to coerce the testimony of two informants, Darla Wharry
and Richards.
Siler is now cooperating with investigators. He faces 45 to 57 months in
federal prison, but the
sentence could be reduced if Siler provides significant assistance in
the FBI's ongoing investigation
of Hamilton and possibly other officers.
Barnett pleaded guilty to extortion and drug distribution on Sept. 18.
He is also cooperating and
was expected to be the prosecution's key witness against Siler.
Siler and Barnett, who were suspended by the Police Department in late
August 1999, were each
fired after their guilty pleas.
So far, Hamilton is charged with three federal offenses for allegedly
tipping off one of his informants,
Darla Wharry, to an undercover police investigation of a Mont Pleasant
crack house in which she
was involved. He is currently the only other officer facing charges in
connection with the probe.
One of the women, Renee Rickson, contends that Siler twice forced her to
have sex, including at
another officer's Sept. 19, 1997, bachelor party at the Glen Sanders
Mansion. Rickson said Siler
also forced her to perform oral sex on another officer. Siler was never
charged with rape or any
other sex crime.
The bridegroom, Officer Paul Steele, and another member of the wedding
party, Officer John
Lewis, were both expected to testify for the prosecution.
Prosecutors said Steele would testify that he woke up to find Siler,
Rickson and Lewis in his
wedding suite at the Glen Sanders. Lewis, who was apparently
intoxicated, passed out in another
room. Steele said he walked out of his bedroom and spotted Rickson
smoking crack from a pipe
constructed from a soda bottle. Siler, wearing boxer shorts, was sitting
on a sofa next to her.
Steele said he was upset by what he saw and told Siler to make Rickson
stop. He claims Rickson
told him to relax on the couch and she then allegedly gave him oral sex.
Lewis, who the city once tried to fire from the Police Department for
using a racial slur, apparently
slept through the incident. He learned about it the next morning and,
prosecutors said, was upset to
learn someone had smoked crack in the suite.
Rickson, a recovering drug addict, is serving time at Albion
Correctional Facility in Orleans County,
for a drug dealing conviction.
Another informant, Tina Siemens, said she heard "on the street" that
Siler would reward informants
with crack. So on Aug. 4, 1999, Siemens contacted Siler and told him a
man in her room at the
Twins Motel on State Street had cocaine.
Siler and Barnett arrived shortly afterward. They strip-searched the
man, identified as James
"Cowboy" Bordwell, and found several $20 bags of crack. A search of his
car turned up additional
bags of crack.
Siemens asked Siler for crack as a reward. He allegedly told her he
would "see her later." Once the
officers were gone, Siemens said she noticed three $20 bags of crack,
which resembled the bags
taken from Bordwell, had been left behind.
Later that night, Siemens said she called Siler to ask for her drugs.
Siler, dressed in street clothes,
came by in his own car. Siler allegedly swore Siemens to secrecy and
threw her a plastic bag
containing a $50 piece of crack.
Seba Richards, who has a number of prostitution arrests on her record,
said she had a sexual
relationship with Siler and provided investigators with a detailed
description of the inside of a
Bellevue apartment he lived in at the time. Richards was Siler's main
informant for a time, but she
eventually worked more with Hamilton, court documents said.
She said both officers gave her information about upcoming police raids,
prostitution raids and other
drug busts to help her from getting arrested.
Hamilton and Siler also relied on Wharry for information. Wharry said
she set up several arrests at
the Twins Motel, telling Hamilton or Siler that drug dealers were in her
room and then leaving the
door ajar so they could easily enter.
Once inside, she said, the officers would arrest the individuals who had
drugs and leave some
behind for her.
On several occasions, Hamilton allegedly instructed Wharry, "Don't tell
anyone I gave you this
stuff."
--
- Outlaw Frog Raper -
Schenectady Copwatch
(518) 356-4238
Chandra Intern
> of them drug-addicted
> prostitutes, by feeding them a steady supply of crack and other drugs.
>
1) prostitute themselves, no surprise there
> admitting that he and other officers gave informants drugs
> for information about criminal
> activities in the city's low-income Hamilton Hill neighborhood.
>
2) rat out other low lifes, who wuddathunkit?
> One woman, Charmaine Ferrell, told authorities that Siler gave her crack
> as often as three times a
> day.
>
3) consort with Police officers...
> Some of the informants also said they saw Siler smoke marijuana and that
> he kept a stash of the
> drug in his apartment.
>
side note: what harm does smoking marijuana do? what's the BFD?
> Three of the women said Siler traded crack for sex with them.
>
4) whore themselves, see 1)
> One of the women, Renee Rickson, contends that Siler twice forced her to
> have sex, including at
> another officer's Sept. 19, 1997, bachelor party at the Glen Sanders
> Mansion. Rickson said Siler
> also forced her to perform oral sex on another officer. Siler was never
> charged with rape or any
> other sex crime.
>
5) whore themselves see 1) and 4)
> Steele said he was upset by what he saw and told Siler to make Rickson
> stop. He claims Rickson
> told him to relax on the couch and she then allegedly gave him oral sex.
>
6) whore themselves see 5), 1) and 4)
>had been left behind.
>
Hahaha.
--
Chandra, the ugly Intern