By Lawrence Buser
The Commercial Appeal
MEMPHIS — Former Memphis police sergeant Norman Benjamin made his first public comments Wednesday on his bizarre and violent behavior last summer, but a judge found it hardly enough to better understand him — or to spare him an eight-year prison sentence.
Benjamin, 47, who shot himself in the stomach and reported that a dark-complexioned Hispanic man was responsible, pleaded guilty to five criminal charges and was hoping for probation.
“Everyone was hoping and praying for you,” Criminal Court Judge Paula Skahan said, recounting the community concern and the police dragnet after the shooting. “It was all a lie. God help any male Hispanic who fit the description and got picked up.... It’s just absolutely outrageous.”
One investigator said Benjamin also offered money to a drug dealer nicknamed “Muscle” to shoot him, Benjamin, or to shoot the boyfriend of a 17-year-old girl to whom he was attracted. Neither was shot, but Benjamin successfully enlisted help to fire multiple shots into a home on Salem where the girl, the boyfriend and several people were staying.
“Here’s a man who’s supposed to be serving and protecting the public, but instead he’s endangering and corrupting the public,” state prosecutor Tom Henderson argued. “He’s yelling ‘cop killer’ in a minority community.... This is a man we gave a gun and a badge to.”
Benjamin pleaded guilty last month to solicitation to commit first-degree murder, delivering a controlled substance to a minor, making a false offense report, reckless endangerment with a dangerous weapon and providing a handgun to a juvenile, a misdemeanor.
His request for probation was denied and he was ordered to begin serving an eight-year sentence.
He will be eligible for parole after serving 30 percent or about two years since he will be credited for the four months he has served in jail.
“Not only have I broken the trust of my family and friends, but also of the citizens of Memphis and Shelby County,” Benjamin said, reading aloud from note cards. “I was proud to wear the shield of the Memphis Police Department. ... I let everybody down. Being a police officer was my life’s work.”
Benjamin was a 14-year police veteran when his strange story began to unfold last Sept. 3 when he was shot in the stomach while in his unmarked squad car in the 4700 block of Summer.
He first blamed an unidentified Hispanic man, then later said he was shot by a woman companion during an argument.
The woman, Martha Mote, was charged, but soon cleared when investigators determined that Benjamin shot himself, though the officer’s motive remains unexplained.
Mote is an aunt of the teenage girl who testified Wednesday that Benjamin bought Xanax for her, food and anything she and other family members wanted.
“He bought the family’s happiness and he wanted us to rely on him for everything,” said the girl, adding that Benjamin also bought her a pink pistol. “He would just flirt. He thought after I turned 18 he might have a chance.”
Defense attorney Blake Ballin agreed the case was bizarre, but noted that Benjamin had served in the military for 15 years, had been a police officer for 14 years and worked a second job as well.
“There was a short period of time when he went off the deep end, but that doesn’t wipe out nearly 30 years of service he gave to his country and to his community,” Ballin said in making the case for probation. “He has shown some real understanding that what he did was outrageous and wrong.”
Copyright 2012 The Commercial Appeal