BRONX NARC UNIT UNDER PRESSURE FOR LYING UNDER OATH TO CONVICT INNOCENT PEOPLE TO REACH QUOTAS

BRONX NARCOTICS UNIT

A former city prosecutor wants the Bronx district attorney to probe a team of narcotics cops he says lied on the stand and helped put away innocent people to meet quotas.
Peter Tilem, a criminal defense lawyer and one-time ADA, has submitted an allegedly damning August deposition to Bronx DA Robert Johnson and Police Commissioner Ray Kelly from a former narcotics detective on the team.

The ex-cop, Genaro Morales, testifying in an unrelated case, admitted that he knew of cops who lied under oath when he worked in the Bronx narcotics unit from the mid-1990s to 2006.

“We received a letter from Mr. Tilem, and the first thing that we will do is have a conversation with him,” said a spokesman for Johnson.

Tilem said the NYPD’s Internal Affairs Bureau also acknowledged receipt of his letter and plans to investigate.

The cops “were under tremendous pressure,’’ Tilem says in the letter. They would “fabricate stories of drug possession or drug sale in order to get their required number of arrests.’’

Morales, in his testimony, talked about one instance in which the cops allegedly locked up an innocent man.

Morales was being crossed-examined by strip-club owner Sam Zherka in a civil caseover a commercial-business dispute, and Zherka, acting as his own lawyer and referring to himself in the third person, asked him:

“Did you ever state to Mr. Zherka, ‘We put away some poor slob in The Bronx?’ ”
“I’m sure it did happen. I just don’t remember the exact conversation we had,” Morales replied about the 2010 incident.

Morales acknowledged that he knew of other detectives who lied to support their arrests.
“Relating to your team?” Zherka asked.

“Not my team — relating to other detectives,” Morales said.

“That worked with you?”

“Possibly,” he said.

Morales didn’t respond to a call seeking comment.