Hello Faithful Reader,
I hope this month's edition of the Black Birdseye View finds you well and in good spirits. I am going to get right to it.
Amid talks about police reform, it is suggested that the police reduce unwarranted use of force and, in its place, fine-tune their de-escalation tactics. When most people think of police reform, their thought process does not go past the physical. The reality is that the conversation about police reform overlooked the apparent elephant in the room. The one that exerts pressure unnecessarily by abusing its position of power.
Here, in my own backyard, between 12 and 15 people were charged with trafficking heroin, starting in December of 2019 through May of 2020.
It took The Raleigh Police Department and the Wake County District Attorney's office several months to investigate concerns first raised in February. Detective Omar Abdullah (RPD) paid his Confidential Informant (CI) for evidence used against 14 people who were arrested and detained for several month with bonds of up to $250.000, only to be released due with the possibility of all of the cases being dismissed due to several improprieties including manufactured evidence identified by the RPD Laboratory.
As I researched this case, here are the facts that I uncovered:
1. Detective Omar Abdullah is a seasoned veteran of the Raleigh Police Department. He contracted the CI with RPD resources and funds to carry out work on behalf of RPD and is afforded the privilege of not knowing that the paid CI engaged in improprieties.
2. For the funds received from Detective Omar Abdullah, the RPD paid informant allegedly provided a substance that looked like heroin.
3. The RPD paid CI produced alleged altered video footage of illegal drug transactions.
4. Detective Abdullah, an 11-year veteran and award-winning RPD officer used the evidence from the RPD paid CI and arrested 14 individuals.
5. It is alleged that there was no testing of the substance thought to be heroin before the 14 individuals' arrest.
6. The 14 individuals were taken into custody based upon the RPD paid CI's evidence.
7. All 14 individuals were arrest during the height of COVID 19.
I reached out to RPD's Public Affairs Manager, Donna-maria Harris, for an official statement and to get clarification regarding the dismissed cases. She responded with the following sentence:
"The Raleigh Police Department is aware of this matter and is investigating it. We are cooperating fully with the District Attorney's Office."
I reached out to Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman and requested an official statement from her office regarding the arrests and was emailed the following statement:
"I have not issued a statement per se but provided the following information during interviews to several media outlets.
Several months ago, our office first received information that a confidential informant might be providing false information to a Raleigh Police Detective Abdullah that resulted in charges against approximately a dozen defendants for trafficking heroin. As lab results began being returned showing no controlled substances, we moved to unsecure bonds and dismiss cases associated with this informant. At this time, we have asked the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation to conduct an investigation into the matter. Currently, there is no evidence that Detective Abdullah knew he was being provided fraudulent information. Nevertheless, this matter is of significant concern and will receive a thorough review by our office for a determination as to whether charges are appropriate against anyone involved."
The following are troublesome statements in the email received from Wake County District Attorney, Lorrin Freeman.
"What we know so far is that we do have a confidential informant who was providing false information to law enforcement and law enforcement was relying upon that in making charging decisions," -Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman.
BBEV questions regarding the statement provided by Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman:
Why does the statement automatically imply that the Detective is innocent, and the CI is guilty?
What is the protocol for arresting someone based on information received from paid Confidential Informants, and is that protocol the same across the board?
Were protocols skipped?
Was there an urgency to bring the 14 individuals to trial?
How does the RPD vet its CI's?
Why did RPD test the drugs and view the video evidence after the 14 individuals were arrested instead of before they were arrested?
Why did it take so long to discover that the evidence was faulty?
"None of us want to be part of a system where a confidential informant is lying to law enforcement, and we're relying on that to prosecute people." - Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman.
Why is there an assumed innocence of the Detective involved at the onset of this internal investigation? Why there an assumed guilt of the paid CI?
(According to ABC News, the investigation regarding the 14 individuals fraudulently charged and detained, is probing every case that the "informant" has been involved in and what, if anything, Detective Abdullah knew about the bad information and phony heroin.)
If the detective hired paid the CI for evidence why is the focus ONLY on reviewing the CI’s past and current cases? Why aren't all cases involving Detective Abdullah being investigated too?
"Certainly, if at some point, we determine that the officer was aware that the confidential informant was providing bad information, then this review will take a different direction," -Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman.
The review needs to take a different turn because:
Should a seasoned detective be aware of the intentions of their RPD paid CI's?
How are RPD officers reprimanded when they let evidence or lack thereof fall through the crack, causing individuals to be charged and detained for crimes based on evidence that turns out to be potentially fraudulent?
"Concerns were first raised near the end of February" - Wake County District Attorney, Lorrin Freeman.
Why did it take months to realize that 14 people had been accused based on fraudulent evidence?
In closing:
A formal complaint has been filed with the Raleigh Internal Affairs Unit to revisit and reopen and reexamine all current and previous cases involving Detective Omar Abdullah. All things withstanding, it would be an egregious error and injustice to assume Detective Abdullah's innocence and the CI's guilt without looking into all cases associated with either of the two.
In addition to filing a formal complaint with RPD's Internal Affairs Unit, I started a petition. The petition requests that previous and current cases involving Detective Omar Abdullah during his tenure with RPD be revisited for accuracy.
· TO SIGN THE PETITION: http://chng.it/k5KKfXJv
Until next time,
Always, Robin
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