Former NYPD Cop Admits To Distributing Meth, Date Rape Drug

BRONXVILLE, NY — A former New York City Police Department officer from Bronxville admitted to trafficking large amounts of illegal drugs.

Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, said Wednesday that former NYPD officer John Cicero, 39, pleaded guilty to distributing large quantities for methamphetamine and gamma-butyrolactone, which is known as GBL and is a liquid date rape drug, in Westchester County and New York City.

Williams said Cicero was once sworn to protect the public but now stands convicted of trafficking illegal drugs.

"As he admitted [Wednesday], over several years, Cicero was a leader of a drug trafficking ring," he said, "and he was personally responsible for moving over 3 kilograms of methamphetamine and 750 liters of GBL, and importing them from overseas.

"Thanks to the dedication of our partners at the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Cicero now awaits sentencing for his dangerous conduct," Williams said.

Authorities said, from 2017 until his arrest in February 2020, Cicero and his co-conspirators stockpiled and sold liters of GBL and kilograms of methamphetamine in apartments, hotel rooms and storage units in the heart of midtown Manhattan and a home in Bronxville.

He repeatedly brokered large-scale narcotics transactions over recorded prison calls with an inmate then in New York state custody.

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection had previously seized GBL sent from China to Cicero's Bronxville address.

As part of his guilty plea, Cicero stipulated that he was an organizer, leader, manager or supervisor in the criminal activity, that he imported methamphetamine and distributed more than 3 kilograms of methamphetamine and 750 liters of GBL.

The criminal activity began years after he left the NYPD, authorities said.

Cicero was arrested Feb. 19, 2020, in a Wall Street hotel room he had rented under a false name. Besides methamphetamine and GBL, law enforcement recovered a bank card and a fake ID with his photo, all in the false name under which the room was rented.

Police also recovered detailed drug ledgers, credit card-making equipment and notebooks full of victims' personally identifiable information.

Cicero is scheduled to be sentenced Feb. 10. He pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring to distribute 50 grams of methamphetamine and GBL, which carries a statutory mandatory minimum term of five years in prison and a maximum penalty of 40 years in prison.