The Associated Press
HOUSTON (AP) -- Five Houston police officers accused of taking money from cantina owners in exchange for protection and forewarning of police raids worked as a team and did little to conceal their illegal operation, according to police affidavits obtained by the Houston Chronicle.
The affidavits say they officers collected about $50 a night from more than local bar owners and used business cards and cell phones to expand and conduct their operation, the newspaper reported in a copyrighted story for Wednesday’s edition.
The officers even used their real names, wore their uniforms and at times implicated fellow officers while talking with bar operators and undercover officers. They used their own cars and trucks, three of which have been seized.
Robbery division Sgt. Freddie T. Gonzales Jr. and patrol officers Rolando Cruz, Javier Gomez, Salve Rogolio Ramirez and David Acosta Gamboa were indicted in early this month on charges of engaging in organized criminal activity.
Gomez also was charged with taking a gun from an undercover officer, a third-degree felony carrying a penalty of two to 10 years in prison and a fine up to $10,000.
Investigators arrested the officers July 11 after an eight-month investigation by the department’s Internal Affairs unit, spurred by a tip from a bar owner.
The five officers are currently on paid leave, confined at home. They can only leave their home with permission and must check in everyday with internal affairs officers. They were also stripped of their service weapons, work keys, badges and hats.
The affidavits describe several occasions in which officers worked together taking money from undercover officer posed as bar owners and employees in return for warnings about impending raids by law enforcement agencies. Audiotapes secretly recorded some of their conversations.
“Let us know when the dogs are going to hit us,” an undercover officer allegedly told one of the officers, Rolando Cruz, in a secretly recorded conversation last fall.
“Yes,” Cruz responded.
Attorneys for the officers say the affidavits, which rely on several unnamed witnesses and confidential informants, have little evidence. They say their clients are innocent and had permission from the department to moonlight as security officers.
“Based on the arrest warrant, I’m having difficulty determining what my client did wrong. The service being provided to the bars was a security service. It’s an officer’s job to provide a police presence at those bars,” said Kim Parks, Ramirez’s attorney.
Jose Macari Martinez, owner of Macari’s Bar, first tipped police about the officers’ operation in October.
Marcari Martinez told police that Gamboa wanted $50 cash every Friday and Saturday night to alert Martinez “two or three hours” before the club was raided by the Houston Police Department, constables’ officers, the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission or Drug Enforcement Administration.
Five bars are identified in the affidavits, but more bars -- spread from Houston’s northeast side down to the southeast side -- are involved, officers close to the investigation told the newspaper. The complete list of cantinas is sealed by court order.