Pubdate: Wed, 19 Jul 2000
Source: San Francisco Examiner (CA)
Copyright: 2000 San Francisco Examiner
Contact:  http://www.examiner.com/
Forum: http://examiner.com/cgi-bin/WebX
Author: Jim Herron Zamora, The Examiner Staff

S.F. COP ACCUSED OF SELLING, USING DRUGS

San Francisco police have accused an officer of selling bogus tablets of 
the drug ecstasy while off duty in Hayward, according to departmental 
misconduct charges.

Officer Chris Greenman, 33, was accused of two departmental charges of 
misconduct for selling the bogus drugs on June 28 and for testing positive 
for methamphetamine the same day, according to charges filed with the 
Police Commission late Friday. He will have an opportunity to enter a plea 
before the full commission on Wednesday night.

Greenman, a five-year department veteran, has been on unpaid suspension 
since Hayward police detained him on June 28. He was not arrested and has 
not been charged with a crime.

Hayward and San Francisco police have declined comment, saying the case 
remains under investigation.

The San Francisco charges could result in Greenman losing his job.

Those charges said that Greenman arranged by telephone to sell 10 tablets 
of ecstasy, worth $150, to a woman secretly working as an informant for the 
Hayward police.

Greenman, according to the charges, met the woman in a parking lot in 
Hayward that was under surveillance.

The woman, whose name was not released, paid Greenman $150 in marked money 
provided by the Hayward police.

In return, she received 10 tablets of what was purported to be ecstasy.

"Subsequent testing revealed that the ecstasy (Greenman) sold to the woman 
in the controlled buy was not really ecstasy as the accused had 
represented," the charges state.

The material sold to the woman was not a controlled substance.

Police would not say what the tablets actually contain.

Sale of fake drugs is still a violation of state law that can result in 
felony or misdemeanor charges, according the San Francisco Police

Department. But officers concede the filing of such charges is quite rare.

Hayward police stopped Greenman on the Hayward/San Mateo Bridge after the 
sale. They found the marked money in his fanny pack, according to the charges.

After Greenman identified himself as a San Francisco cop, Hayward officers 
declined to arrest him. But they did notify SFPD's internal affairs unit, 
which launched its own investigation.

Later that same evening, an internal affairs investigator ordered Greenman 
to give a urine sample that tested positive for methamphetamine, according 
to the charges.

Police also searched Greenman's Livermore home in Alameda County.

Greenman had been assigned to the evening shift of the SFPD's Tenderloin 
Task Force until his suspension. He could not be reached for comment. 
Because the alleged wrongdoing took place while he was off duty, he is not 
being represented by the police union in the misconduct case.

The Hayward police probe could result in the filing of criminal charges in 
Alameda County Superior Court by the district attorney's office.

But even if that agency declines to press charges, the officer's police 
career in The City may be in jeopardy as a result of the internal affairs 
investigation.

Although prosecutors often decline to file charges in cases like 
Greenman's, a police agency has wider discretion in disciplining one of its 
members if an internal investigation finds evidence of illegal or improper 
activity by an officer.

Greenman is accused of conduct that reflects discredit on the department 
and of engaging in conduct that subverts the good order of the department, 
the charges state.
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