Metro cocaine probe widens

Cathy Scott

Monday, Oct. 28, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.

A Metro Police narcotics officer's adult son is being investigated in connection with a missing kilo of cocaine and a gun from the officer's unmarked police car, police sources said.

"It's all circumstantial evidence at this point," Sgt. Greg McCurdy said.

The kilogram of cocaine was discovered missing in February by Officer Joe Kelly's captain, Charles Davidaitis. If sold on the street, the kilo has an estimated value of $100,000.

"We've got some problems over there (in narcotics)," McCurdy said. "The cocaine was missing, and they were looking for it."

Four narcotics officers, Sgts. Larry McMahan, 46, and Davis Logue, 35, and detectives Max Huggins, 35, and Kelly, 45, knew about the missing kilo, but didn't notify Davidaitis, McCurdy said.

Kelly, a K-9 handler assigned to the narcotics unit at the time, had checked out the kilo of cocaine from the evidence vault so he could train his dog to sniff out the drug.

In February, while supervisors were routinely checking the training of K-9s and procedures for training the dogs to sniff out drugs, the missing kilo was discovered. Two K-9s and two canine handlers are assigned to the narcotics detail.

"It looks like a loose procedure that the dope guys had used to train the dogs," McCurdy said.

Also, the date in which the kilo ended up missing still wasn't known, McCurdy said. Reports that the drugs had been missing since August 1995 were inaccurate, he said, noting that "it was probably after that."

Kelly, in the first investigation, told investigators he had gone out of town and returned home on a Saturday. His car was unlocked and the kilo, a department-issued pistol and other police equipment that had been in the car were missing.

Kelly's son, whose name has not been released, had been staying at the house and left for military duty before Kelly returned home. Police said the military duty and operation the son is involved in can't be interrupted at this point. It wasn't clear why.

Meantime, Huggins, who has been on the force for 16 years, and Kelly, a seven-year veteran, are being scheduled for drug tests, McCurdy said.

Officers who work in narcotics are given random drug tests throughout the year, Deputy Chief Kyle Edwards said.

Edwards said the officers were not given drug tests when it was learned the kilo was missing.

Initially, Davidaitis looked into the case as a division investigation and did not turn it over to the Internal Affairs Bureau.

The case has now been turned over to Capt. Mike Zagorski as a criminal investigation, McCurdy said. Results of the investigation will be turned over to the district attorney's office for possible prosecution, he said.

After the first investigation, disciplinary action was taken against all four officers, and Kelly has since been transferred to the patrol division. Details of the others' discipline have not been released.

An initial polygraph test given to Kelly turned up inconclusive, McCurdy said. Because it was inconclusive, a second test was given and Kelly failed a portion of it, he said.

"It was showing 'deceptive' in one area where he may have known more," he said.

That's when the decision to investigate it as a criminal case was made, he said.