Pubdate: Sun, 13 Jun 2010 Source: Post-Standard, The (Syracuse, NY) Copyright: 2010 Advance Publications Contact: http://www.syracuse.com/mailforms/opinion/index.ssf Website: http://www.syracuse.com/poststandard/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/686 Author: Jim O'Hara Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/corrupt.htm (Corruption - United States) PROSECUTORS DETAIL TEEN DRUG RING RUN BY FORMER SYRACUSE COP It began around the end of the school year last June with teenagers hanging around a former Syracuse police officer's home to smoke cigarettes and marijuana. The number of youths hanging around the Camillus home began to grow. His vehicle was like a magnet attracting teens for short encounters. Neighbors and police began to take notice. Before long, the former law enforcement officer was running an organized drug ring with kids ranging in age from 13 to 17. Kids were both buyers and sellers. Some teens working for him phoned in orders for marijuana to deliver to their peers. A few were trusted enough for the ex-cop to front them drugs to sell as they saw fit with the proceeds eventually turned in to him. During last summer's State Fair, he daily sent a team through the fairgrounds to make drug sales. He dropped them off in the morning, their pockets stuffed with drugs to walk the fairgrounds making sales. He'd pick them up later in the day to collect the profits. But the trafficking operation was short-lived. It came crashing down after one youth told police how the ex-cop had provided him cigarettes and marijuana. A raid on the former officer's home Sept. 24 turned up a small amount of marijuana and psilocybin mushrooms and landed him in jail. That's the story prosecutors say they plan to prove as they move forward with a 46-count indictment handed down last month against former Syracuse police Officer Fredrick J. Baunee, 49, of 311 Westfall St. The youths are not being charged due to their ages, prosecutors said. The May 5 indictment identifies 11 youths as participants in Baunee's ring. Prosecutors say they don't know how much drugs were sold or how many youths were involved. They suspect more teens were involved. Baunee was scheduled to be back in court Friday for a conference between the lawyers and Onondaga County Judge Anthony Aloi. But defense lawyer Paul Carey cancelled the appearance after receiving a letter indicating the prosecution is not offering any deals. With the prosecution seeking a state prison sentence and Baunee's registration as a sex offender, the case appears headed for trial, Carey said. How it worked Senior Assistant District Attorney Michael Ferrante and Assistant District Attorney Cindi Newtown, in separate interviews, provided the following account of the ring: It appears to have begun last June with youths who knew Baunee's teenage son. "They'd be at sporting events, school functions, parties and someone would ask if anyone knew where they could get some marijuana," Newtown said. "The answer was always Fred or one of the kids he had selling for him." Baunee made some drug sales himself. "They were almost entirely to kids," she said. But a lot of the trafficking was done by the youths. Teenagers working for Baunee would take requests from other youths, call Baunee to order the drugs and he would go wherever they wanted to meet and supply the drugs for his sellers to deliver. The proceeds would then be returned to Baunee. The teenagers were selling marijuana at $10 for a gram and $15 for a gram and a half. Some were given a larger amount of marijuana to sell as they wanted, giving Baunee the money when the drugs were sold, Newtown said. "He only trusted a select few," Ferrante said. The young sellers were sometimes provided money and sometimes drugs as compensation. "If they sold a certain amount they'd get a certain amount for their own use," Newtown said. Baunee took his business on the road to places such as the fairgrounds or a pizzeria, prosecutors said. Broken windows "They worked every day at the state fair," Ferrante said. After employees at Pacino's Pizzeria in Camillus foiled an attempted drug deal between two youths, the West Genesee Street business's windows were broken, authorities said. "I understand the manager saw a bag of pot. He told him to leave," owner Steve Dann recalled. A short time later, an irate Baunee showed up, claiming he was a police officer, Dann said. "I don't know what he was screaming about. He was just screaming," Dann said. About a week later, Baunee drove six youths to the shop the night of Sept. 2 to retaliate, the prosecution contends. Baunee and four youths threw rocks through the windows while two remained in his truck, Newtown said. The next morning, Dann got a call from the police telling him that two windows, worth a total of $600, were broken. Police at the time were unaware of the link to the Baunee drug ring, Newtown said. Sex abuse alleged Baunee's crimes are not limited to drug sales, prosecutors say. Baunee is accused of touching two boys in a sexual manner while they were asleep, Newtown said. The 15-year-old boys were spending the night at Baunee's during a sleepover, she said. Newtown said it took some time before the two teenagers, identified as getting drugs from Baunee, admitted to being victims of sexual abuse. It's difficult for 15-year-old boys to admit to having had sexual contact with a man, she said. Given that all the youths involved in the Baunee investigation attended the same school and hung out together, the sex abuse victims were concerned about the stigma associated with such conduct, the prosecutor said. Newtown said Baunee's crimes continued while he was in jail. He is accused of tampering with a witness in February or March: He tried to get a youth to not cooperate with police or testify in the grand jury, authorities say. The indictment also accuses Baunee of using "family members" to try to collect drug proceeds. Ferrante said that also occurred while he was in jail. The relatives may not have known the debts were from drug sales, Ferrante said. The neighborhood There were no teens hanging around Baunee's home during three recent visits to Westfall Street. Baunee's one-story, ranch-style home sits on a 50-foot by 125-foot lot just one house away from the street's dead end. There's an above-ground pool in the backyard. At the dead end, a pathway leads into the woods where authorities said Baunee and the youths hung out. The suspicious neighbors, who kick-started the investigation of the drug ring, declined comment. One neighbor, who did not wish to be identified, said neighbors wouldn't talk to a reporter because they don't want to do anything that would jeopardize the case and return Baunee to the neighborhood. Camillus Police Chief Thomas M. Winn, who referred to some of the youths as victims, also declined comment. - --- [sidebar] Fredrick J. Baunee Fredrick J. Baunee began his career as a police officer March 31, 1989. He was in the same police academy class as Police Chief Frank Fowler, who declined to comment on Baunee. He was in the news in October 1994 when he was struck in the neck with a Mountain Dew soda bottle thrown through the open window of his patrol car in the parking lot of the Boys & Girls Club on East Fayette Street. Baunee suffered a cut neck and a concussion. Baunee was accused in May 2007 of providing alcohol to a 14-year-old boy as they rode around in Baunee's private vehicle. The boy also said Baunee rubbed his hand on the boy's leg and face. Baunee was suspended. He retired from the Syracuse Police Department in June 2007 while the case was pending. He testified at trial he did not provide the boy any alcohol and did not know how the youth got intoxicated. A jury of six women found him guilty in April 2008 of endangering the welfare of a child. Syracuse City Judge Kate Rosenthal sentenced him to three years on probation. Baunee admitted that his arrest on the Camillus charges amounted to a violation of his probation in that earlier case. Rosenthal last month sentenced him to the time he had served in jail since being arrested on the Camillus charges. Baunee receives an annual pension of $49,315, according to state records. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom