Wednesday, 4 June 2008

Former officer pleads guilty over sham raid

James McCabe … extradited from Cambodia.Photo: Peter Morris

The Sydney Morning Herald.
Bellinda Kontominas
June 4, 2008

A FORMER senior police officer is facing up to 20 years in jail after he stole drugs in a pretend raid, a court has been told.

James Anthony McCabe, 38, a former Victorian police officer, yesterday pleaded guilty in the Sydney District Court to robbing methamphetamines from a drug trafficker during a fake police operation in the inner- west suburb of Enfield in 2002. The offence carries a maximum sentence of 20 years.

An agreed statement of facts tendered to court revealed that McCabe, who was working as a drug-trafficking investigator with the Australian Crime Commission, met with a NSW police officer, Detective Sergeant Samuel Foster, also with the commission.

Foster had arranged for his contacts to set up a drug deal in a car, which the two policemen would then bust.

Under the plan, the drug trafficker, who cannot be named, would be told the police were prepared to "ignore or go easy" on him because their main interest was in the other parties involved, the court heard. The trafficker was likely to agree to the arrangement because losing the drugs would be preferable to arrest, the court heard.

Shortly before 8pm, as the deal was being done, McCabe and Foster, who has already been sentenced for his part in the crime, approached the car. McCabe handcuffed one dealer and Foster took his particulars "to make it appear to be a legitimate arrest", the court heard.

Once the drug trafficker had handed over the speed to police, McCabe drove the man he had "arrested" to The Rocks where they met up with two others who had arranged the deal. They then split the drugs.

Police became aware of McCabe's part in the crime through phone taps and surveillance. For his part, Foster pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 7½ years in jail with a non-parole period of 4½ years.

McCabe, who lives in Booker Bay on the Central Coast, was arrested after being extradited from Cambodia, despite no existence of a formal extradition treaty between the countries.

He was due to face trial in the Sydney District Court this week on drug and armed robbery charges, but pleaded guilty after a deal was struck with the Director of Public Prosecutions.

McCabe will be sentenced next month.

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