Pubdate: Thu, 20 Feb 2003
Source: San Antonio Express-News (TX)
Copyright: 2003 San Antonio Express-News
Contact:  http://www.mysanantonio.com/expressnews/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/384
Author: Lynn Brezosky, Associated Press
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/corrupt.htm (Corruption - United States)

TAPES AIRED IN DONNA COPS' TRIAL

McALLEN - Jurors in the bribery trial of two former Donna police
officers viewed video in court Wednesday showing officers taking cash
payoffs for providing patrol car escorts for marijuana loads.
In another video taken in the same Pharr motel room a few days before,
informant Rigoberto Quintanilla is heard laying the groundwork for
twice-a-week follows for his shipments.

"Tell me, I'll be there if you want to do it," an officer responds.

He's then heard on the video asking for an advance of the $800 he is
promised for providing his first escort a few days later.

"I'm low on funds, dude, I've got my daughter's birthday."

He also indicates it's not his first time participating in a drug
move.

"I don't think it's a big deal," says the officer, identified as
Gerardo Vigil. "I've done it."

Prosecutors played the tape as testimony continued in the trial of
Vigil and Marco Abel Partida, former acting Donna police chief.

Both are accused of using their patrol vehicles to protect what they
believed to be marijuana loads traveling through the Donna city limits.

Quintanilla was acting as a federal informant in "Operation Blue
Shield," a bribery sting stemming from two recorded patrol car
escorts, in April and November of 2001.

Court papers show Quintanilla offered information about crooked
border-region police officers after being indicted for attempting to
transport 6,000 pounds of marijuana through an immigration checkpoint.

He turned the investigators on to Partida, his friend since the two
attended police academy and worked for the Hidalgo County Sheriff's
Department in the 1990s.

Partida still was acting chief of the 17-member Donna department when
he was arrested Nov. 13 on a five-count grand jury indictment. He is
accused of accepting $2,200 to protect what he thought were two
300-pound shipments.

Vigil was arrested the same day as he reported to his new post with
the Mission Police Department. He's charged with three counts in
connection with the second shipment.

The defense has said it will prove their clients were entrapped by
"government manufactured crime."

"There's no denying he did it," Vigil's attorney Luis Singleterry
said. "But if he was entrapped, he's not breaking the law."

Tuesday's opening-day testimony concentrated on Partida.

Jurors viewed a grainy surveillance video recorded in April 2001 that
shows a man identified as Partida counting out $500 from
Quintanilla.

"Easiest five hundred bucks you ever made," Quintanilla says in the
video.

"Too easy," Partida responded. "I'm in the wrong business,
dude."
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake