A Total of 14 Police Officers Including 20 Arrested in Mississippi Narcotics Corruption Operation
Fourteen current and former law-enforcement officers are part of twenty individuals charged taken into custody in Mississippi and Tennessee for taking illicit payments from narcotics dealers in to provide law enforcement cover, in what officials labeled "a monumental betrayal of public trust".
The arrests follow a years-long probe by national law enforcement who acted as narcotics dealers. Two of the defendants were Mississippi sheriffs.
National authorities initiated the sting after receiving reports from actual drug traffickers about having to pay bribes to officers.
This corruption scheme allegedly extended outside the Mississippi Delta region into Memphis, Tennessee, and Miami in Florida.
"The original complaints that started the inquiry were from narcotics traffickers," a federal prosecutor stated during a press briefing on Thursday.
Certain law enforcement members had received bribes between $20,000 (£15,000) and $37,000, the legal official added.
The sting involved covert national officers acting as drug dealers with fake narcotics, which the defendants reportedly thought to be 25 kilograms (55 pounds) of cocaine.
"They betrayed the public," stated a senior FBI official. "They betrayed the trust that the public placed in them, shamed the badge and weakened the efforts of good law enforcement officers across this area and locality."
These detentions take place as U.S. officials have embarked on air strikes in South America against alleged drug traffickers.
