A federal judge ordered a former Arkansas State Police lieutenant on Tuesday to remain in custody until trial on federal charges accusing him of selling drugs he stole from the property room he managed.
As more details emergedabout an FBI investigation of Lt. Sedrick Reed, who was fired after his arrest last week, U.S. Magistrate Judge J. Thomas Ray said he has no confidence that Reed would not flee before trial.
Ray also ordered Reed’s cousin and co-defendant, Lamont Johnson, to remain in custody, at least for now,while allowing him to reserve his right to present evidence later in support of a request for pretrial release.
Reed, 43, and Johnson, 45, were arrested Thursday, after the execution of search warrants at the men’s Little Rock homes, where federal agents reported finding remnants of drugs that had been tested atthe state Crime Laboratory and stored in the state police property room, as well as stolen guns and large amounts of cash.
Ray said details that Special Agent Mike Lowe of the FBI revealed Tuesday from the witness stand persuaded him that federal prosecutors have a “strong case” againstReed, a 17-year state police veteran who appears to have “an utter and complete disregard” for protecting the integrity of drug cases. Ray said the testimony, backed up by surveillance photographs and secret audio recordings, also “provides me with absolutely nothing to believe I could trust Mr. Reed” not toflee before trial.
Ray noted that the strength of the government’s case provides plenty of incentive for Reed to flee, and that his law-enforcement training only increases the chances he could successfully resist arrest, putting law-enforcement officers and the community in danger.
Lowe testified that agents found more than a kilogram of cocaine and six to seven 6 to 7 ounces of heroin in a shoebox in Reed’s bedroom closet, another trooper’s missing gun in a fanny pack in one of Reed’s five cars, and, in a storage building at his home, a suitcase full of ripped-open evidence wrappers with markings indicating they had contained seized drugs that had been tested by the state Crime Laboratory and then stored in the property room.
Lowe said a closer examination of the wrappers indicates that they contained cocaine and heroin that was seized in two separate drug interdiction cases, in which state troopers search vehicles for drugs during traffic stops on state highways. He said that in one seizure in 2009 or 2010, a trooper seized 10 kilograms of cocaine, while in the other case, a different trooper seized two kilogramsof cocaine and 16 kilograms of heroin. A kilogram equals 2.2 pounds.
Lowe said that a search of the property room for the cocaine and heroin, which had been used in court proceedings and was awaiting destruction, turned up only a portion of the drugs. The drugs still missing included 4.5 kilograms of heroin.
Agents also found cash at the men’s houses, Lowe testified. He said that at Reed’s home at 8303 Winterwood Drive, agents found thousands of dollars in cash, in $1,000 stacks, in the backs of framed pictures hanging on the wall. In Johnson’s home at 4406 Arehart Drive, he said, agents found more than $55,000 stashed in the attic, as well as a bag with drug residue sitting near the toilet and two guns, including a 9mm handgun that had been reported stolen from a North Little Rock home, and another 9mm with its serial number obliterated.
Lowe testified that among the five guns found in Reed’s home was a .40-caliber Glock that had once belonged to another state trooper who had resigned or retired years earlier. He said that state policesearched for the gun in 2007 but could never find it, and eventually entered it into a computer system as stolen.
Lowe also described a “violent incident” in 2011 that he said was documented in Reed’s state police file, even though no criminal charges resulted from it. He said the incident grew out of a situation on July Fourth of that year in which some children in Reed’s neighborhood threw fireworks at Reed, prompting him to “grab one of the children by the neck, and hit one of the girls.”
Days later, Lowe said, the mother of the children was driving in the area when Reed tried to pull her over and drove up beside her on Base Line Road, pointing a gun at her. As she tried to flee, she drove her vehicle into a tree, he said.
The Pulaski County prosecuting attorney’s office investigated a complaint that the woman lodged about the incident and ended up sending a “letter of censure” to Reed’s supervisors that was kept in his file, Lowe said.
Lowe, part of a multiagency public-corruption task force, also testified about events detailed in an affidavit and criminal complaint that led to the search warrants being executed last week. He said a confidential witness began cooperating with the FBI in June in return for recommendations of leniency when sentenced on pending charges.
The informant had been purchasing cocaine from Johnson since the summer of 2012 and knew Reed was a relative of Johnson’s, Lowe testified. The agent said the informant had paid Johnson $900 an ounce for cocaine on an almost weekly basis between June and December of 2012, until the informant severed his relationship with Johnson after the informant had some drugs stolen and couldn’t pay Johnson for them.
The informant then began cooperating with the FBI and, at their request, re-initiated contact with Johnson, making five monitored purchases of cocaine from him in June and July, Lowe testified.
Testifying about another informant, who he said wasalso cooperating with the FBI in exchange for leniency in a pending case, Lowe described a conversation the informant had with Reed about guns. He said Reed described removing four “trash guns” from the evidence room and selling them for $250, through the informant, then complaining that he should have gotten more money for them.
Lowe said that informant also described purchasing 2 kilograms of cocaine from Reed for $30,000, “a relatively low price,” and then attempting to resell it for $25,000 a kilogram until the potential buyer refused it, saying it was of “low quality.”
The informant then contacted Reed and demanded his money back for one of the kilograms, but Reed didn’t want to reimburse the informant until the informant told him, “You bring me the money back or I’ll take this to your captain and see what he says,”Lowe testified.
He said Reed then returned $15,000 to the informant. He said this was what Johnson and Reed were discussing in an intercepted telephone call between the two on July 12, a call that was detailed in the affidavit. During that call, Johnson could be heard saying, “I don’t want the problem with that other one. It is hard for me to win with that other stuff since it’s so old.”
Reed responded, “Yeah, but it’s all I got. When all that mess happened with that other fool, I had to sit down.”
Lowe testified that after the phone call, surveillance cameras recorded Reed going into the evidence room, taking out a box and walking it into an adjoining room containing seized drug scales and packaging equipment. He then returned the box to the evidence room, and was recorded entering Johnson’s’ house with a package about half an hour later, Lowe said.
Northwest Arkansas, Pages 9 on 07/24/2013