Fort Lauderdale Detective Pleads Guilty To Money Laundering

Jorge Reyes, an eight-year veteran of the Fort Lauderdale Police Department, has pleaded guilty to laundering more than $100,000:

Officials with the State Attorney's Office would not provide details on the plea agreement, or say whether Reyes is cooperating with prosecutors to implicate other people in the ongoing investigation.  "At this point we are still looking at it and we are unable to comment, or make any statements whatsoever," said Ed Griffith, spokesman for the Miami-Dade County State Attorney's Office.  "But it's my understanding that he did plead guilty."

Ironically, Reyes was one of two Fort Lauderdale detectives assigned to a joint task force of local, state and federal authorities to investigate organized crime money laundering enterprises.

Last October another man, Luis E. Calvo Jr., an accomplice in the crime with Reyers, pleaded guilty:

According to sources close to the case who did not wish to be identified, Reyes recruited Calvo and then provided him with confidential and privileged information that allowed him to pick up money from a suspect who was under surveillance by the money-laundering task force.  The investigation culminated in the early-morning hours of Oct. 8 in the parking lot of the Broward Mall in Plantation, where Calvo picked up an undisclosed amount of cash from another personm sources said.  As the monetary exchange unfolded, Reyes reportedly sat in a separate vehicle, overseeing the exchange from a distance.