Sixteen New York City cops will be arraigned today following indictments by a Bronx grand jury for their alleged roles in a wide-spread ticket-fixing ring within the NYPD as reported by the Daily News: "ten of the ensnared cops have been indicted on charges related to fixing tickets, while six others are facing raps for crimes uncovered on wiretaps during the sweeping probe, said a source close to the investigation," and the charges include perjury, bribery, obstruction of justice, grand larceny and official misconduct.
Three charged cops are union trustees and six others are union delegates as reported by the New York Post.
The investigation was "plagued by leaks to union officials from within the Internal Affairs Bureau, several people briefed on the inquiry have said, and the leaks prompted a separate inquiry" as reported by William K. Rashbaum and Al Baker for The New York Times: "the lieutenant charged in the case, Jenarra Cobb, who worked on the initial stages of the inquiry when she was in Internal Affairs, has been indicted on several misdemeanor counts, disclosing wiretap information, official misconduct and obstructing governmental administration, several people said."
The Bronx District Attorney sought the criminal indictments for only the most egregious incidents of alleged police misconduct uncovered during the two-year ticket-fixing probe, and hundreds of other cops may be subject to internal NYPD disciplinary proceedings.
The alleged misconduct by police officers could compromise thousands of criminal cases which they investigated as reported by Kevin Deustch for the Daily News: "at least three juries have already acquitted defendants because they didn't trust arresting officers' testimony.
