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Hunker has been suspended with pay pending an investigation into new allegations of misconduct.
Miami Herald, The (FL) - December 10, 2012
arrests, those arrests were actually done by other law enforcement entities, the report states.
Federal agents trying to snare drug dealers typically funnel huge amounts of drug money back to the South American cartels to develop
more investigative leads. The problem with Bal Harbour police, according to the Justice Department report, is that the agency does not
follow strict federal rules that ensure high-level arrests and cap the amount of undercover money that can be sent back to drug kingpins.
Bal Harbour police laundered money without adequate written policies, with no prosecutorial oversight, and with no audits of the
undercover bank accounts, according to the Justice Department report.
Thomas Roell, a retired Miami-Dade assistant state attorney who served as acting director of the South Florida Money Laundering Strike
Force a federally-sponsored, multi-agency task force that Hunker once led told a Justice Department investigator that the actions of
the Bal Harbour-Glades County unit have hindered the success of the strike force, the report states.
For years, Bal Harbours department of 30 officers, serving a village of 2,574 people, has participated in a federal forfeiture program that
allows cops to seize cash, boats, cars and other possessions from suspected drug dealers and money launderers and keep a cut of
the proceeds.
While small police departments rarely venture beyond their borders, Bal Harbours force has become a massive cash generator,
infiltrating drug organizations across the country with no connection to the coastal village.
Armed with a team of snitches and undercover cops, the vice unit makes few arrests, but seizes a fortune in cash every year. In 2011, Bal
Harbour led all police agencies in Florida in the amount of money received through federal forfeitures: $5.1 million.
For the past year, though, the village has been forced to turn over reams of records for a grueling audit that resulted from Bal Harbours
refusal to cooperate with a routine compliance review, according to the Justice Departments report.
The findings are now under review by Justice Department prosecutors.
As a result of the investigative findings, the village is now being forced to return $3.1 million the villages cut of the seized drug money
in fiscal 2011 $407,969 in additional proceeds and another $709,836 in money that was not supposed to be spent on salaries and
benefits.
Treppeda has said that the village has only about $2 million left in seized cash.
Brian Mulheren, president of the Bal Harbour Citizens Coalition, a volunteer group of residents, said the allegations against Hunker are
troubling, but that village leaders also should be held accountable for the police departments failings.
You dont scapegoat just the chief, Mulheren said of Hunkers suspension. The village manager, the finance director, the village
attorney and the village elected officials all knew about this.
Provided By: The McClatchy Company
Index terms: Bal Harbour Police; U.S. Justice Department; The Justice Department; The Miami Herald; Justice Department; Justice Department Office of
Inspector General; Miami-Dade Police Academy; Bal Harbour Citizens Coalition
Personal names: Thomas Hunker; Jay Smith; Jean Rosenfield; Michael Daddario; Richard Sharpstein; Thomas Roell; Brian Mulheren
Record: 201212102203KNRIDDERFLMIAMIH_61cf5dab91d9e2ab7f8b3e1cfc7f3c59
Copyright: Copyright (c) 2012 The Miami Herald