Pubdate: Tue, 10 Oct 2000 Source: Corpus Christi Caller-Times (TX) Copyright: 2000 Corpus Christi Caller-Times Address: P.O. Box 9136, Corpus Christi, TX 78469-9136 Feedback: http://www.caller.com/commcentral/email_ed.htm Website: http://www.caller.com/ Author: Dan Parker Bookmark: Texas clippings http://www.mapinc.org/states/tx.htm OFFICERS ACCUSED OF FALSE ALIBI Woman Never Noticed Officers, Detective Said Two Corpus Christi police officers stole money from a motorist and tried to cover it up with an alibi, a police internal affairs investigator testified in court Monday. Officers Raul Natividad and Thomas Hudgins, both 33, are charged with third-degree felony theft for allegedly stealing $5,000 cash from Enrique "Henry" Rivera, who admitted on the witness stand that he was a drug dealer. The officers have pleaded innocent. Natividad and Hudgins were fired from the Corpus Christi Police Department in November. They have appealed and are on suspension without pay pending arbitration. Natividad and Hudgins told police dispatchers they would respond to a call about a suspicious person in the 2700 block of Willard Street during the early hours of July 14, 1999, but the officers instead stopped Rivera on Lantana Street - far from Willard Street - prosecutor Mark Stolley has said. Michael Trimyer, an internal affairs investigator with the Corpus Christi Police Department, testified Monday that he believed the officers volunteered to check out the suspicious-person report as an alibi for the theft. After Rivera reported the theft, Trimyer phoned the woman who had reported a suspicious person walking near her home. Stolley played a tape of the conversation for jurors Monday. On the tape, the woman said a police car may have stopped by her neighborhood but that she looked out her windows and never saw one. A dispatcher testified earlier that the caller didn't want officers to come to her door. Police investigating Rivera's theft allegation never checked for fingerprints on the officers' patrol car or on Rivera's truck, Trimyer said under questioning by Natividad's defense attorney, Terry Shamsie. "In retrospect, it would have been a good idea," Trimyer said. John Aguirre, 27, testified last week that Natividad and Hudgins talked to him not long after the theft and admitted they stole the money from Rivera. Aguirre, who owned an auto accessories business at the time, said he often socialized with a group of police officers. - --- MAP posted-by: Thunder