Pubdate: Fri, 03 Nov 2006
Source: New York Post (NY)
Copyright: 2006 N.Y.P. Holdings, Inc.
Contact:  http://www.nypost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/296
Author: Larry Celona, and Clemente Lisi
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Cannabis)

WIFE'S 'POT' ROAST

Bid To 'Save ' Cop'

Call it meatballs alla marijuana.

An NYPD detective who tested positive for cannabis last  year faced
having his 22-year career go up in smoke -  until his wife admitted
she spiked his meatballs with  marijuana in order to get him fired
because she feared  he'd die in the line of duty, sources said yesterday.

In fact, the cop's firefighter brother was killed on 
9/11.

Anthony Chiofalo, a member of the NYPD's elite Joint  Terrorism Task
Force, failed a random drug test after  traces of marijuana were found
in his system.

Chiofalo, who was automatically suspended without pay,  proclaimed his
innocence and requested a departmental  hearing.

Chiofalo told his Detectives Endowment  Association-assigned lawyer
that his wife, Cathy,  occasionally smoked marijuana to alleviate back
pain,  but that he never puffed on a joint, the sources said.

During the departmental trial, the NYPD's Internal  Affairs Bureau
interviewed Cathy, who confessed to them  that in the summer of 2005,
she cooked up two separate  pots of meatballs and laced them with weed
so her  husband would test positive and get booted from the  force.

"I'm afraid he's going to get killed," a police source  quoted Cathy
as telling IAB investigators.

Cathy's justification for mixing marijuana with the  ground beef was
that she feared for her husband's life  following the Sept. 11 attacks
- - particularly now that  her husband worked for an elite unit that
investigates  terrorism.

She also told the department that she had expected the  NYPD would
force her husband to retire with his  pension, not fire him, if he
failed a drug test, the  sources said.

On 9/11, Chiofalo's brother, Nicholas, was killed at  the World Trade
Center. Also killed that day were two  of Anthony Chiofalo's former
partners - Joseph Vigiano  and Michael Curtin - while he worked at the
75th  Precinct in East New York, Brooklyn.

Friends said Chiofalo was "shocked" when his lawyer and  IAB
investigators broke the news to him that his wife  had been the one
responsible for his failing the drug  test a year ago.

At the trial, an expert testified on Chiofalo's behalf  that marijuana
ingested with food would turn up on a  drug test even a few months
later.

Chiofalo and his wife passed a polygraph test.

On Tuesday, a judge ruled that the department should  reinstate
Chiofalo.

NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly will make the final  decision.

"No comment. No comment," said a woman who answered the  door last
night at Chiofalo's home.

Chiofalo's friends hope Kelly gives him his job back.

"Tony is a cop's cop," said John Vigiano, a retired  FDNY captain
whose two sons died on 9/11. "The Police  Department needs do to the
right thing and reinstate  him."

Detectives Endowment Assn. President Mike Palladino  declined to
comment.

Cathy has not been charged by Suffolk County cops, in  whose
jurisdiction she cooked up the meatballs.
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MAP posted-by: Larry Seguin