13 Suspended in New York Police Scandal

In a major corruption scandal, 13 police officers from the same Brooklyn precinct were suspended without pay late Tuesday amid charges that they extorted money and drugs from narcotics dealers and then sold the drugs on the streets.

All of the officers, including a sergeant with 17 years on the force and a policewoman, were ordered to turn in their badges and revolvers while a grand jury considered the allegations against them. Police said the misconduct investigation had been under way for more than a year and two policemen had worn hidden tape recorders to gather evidence against their comrades.

Ordered to Station

At dinner time, all police officers on patrol at the 77th Precinct in Brooklyn’s Bedford-Stuyvesant section--a neighborhood long troubled by narcotics trafficking--were suddenly ordered to return to the station house. While their shaken fellow officers looked on, those under suspicion who were working the shift were notified that they were being suspended without pay for conduct unbecoming an officer.

As word of the suspension spread, reporters and neighborhood residents converged on the precinct and police re-enforcements were called to maintain order. But there were no incidents as officers who were not relieved of their duties went back to work.

Mayor Edward I. Koch said he had known of the investigation by the Police Department’s Internal Affairs Division for some time and was “distressed” by the allegations.

Acknowledges Corruption

“We have 27,000 cops. There are going to be some who are corrupt,” the mayor said. “That is why we have the IAD to investigate them.”

The mayor said the problem came to police attention in 1985.

“In 1985, the Internal Affairs Division uncovered corruption among a group of police officers in the 77th Precinct,” Koch said in a prepared statement. “The Police Department brought that information to the Special Prosecutor for the New York City Criminal Justice System, Joe Hynes.

“Police Commissioner Ben Ward and the special prosecutor have been working together since then in a joint investigation. I have been kept informed of the progress of that investigation by the Police Department.”

Neither Ward nor Hynes had any comment Tuesday on the suspensions. But other city officials said that during the inquiry undercover policemen had infiltrated areas where drugs were sold and had recorded conversations between the suspended policemen and narcotics traffickers. The recordings allegedly show that the 13 officers extorted money and drugs from the dealers.

It was understood that the investigation was continuing. Police were trying to determine whether superiors above the level of sergeant or other precinct personnel were involved in the alleged scheme.

Shakedown Charged

Officials said the investigation began when the Police Department received complaints from narcotics traffickers in Brooklyn. The traffickers said they were being shaken down by policemen.

Police indicated that the officers who wore the tape recorders were not suspended but were transferred from the station house to police headquarters in Manhattan in recent days.

The 77th Precinct has 17 sergeants and 205 officers, said Sgt. Diane Kubler, a department spokeswoman.

In the last five years, the New York City Police Department has been shaken by several scandals, including the torturing of drug suspects by five policemen in a Queens station house. Two officers in that case were convicted. Trials for the three others charged are still pending.

In the early 1970s a city investigation showed widespread and institutionalized corruption in the department. It was found that officers were giving protection to gamblers and drug dealers in return for bribes.

But in recent years tighter regulations and increased supervision were believed to have limited such widespread police problems.