Crooked Uptown Cop Gets 6 Years In Prison, DA Says

WASHINGTON HEIGHTS-INWOOD, NY — A former police officer assigned to an Uptown Manhattan precinct will spend a number of years behind bars for his crooked actions, prosecutors announced Wednesday.

Johnny Diaz, 48, was sentenced to six years in state prison Wednesday after pleading guilty to charges of criminal possession of a controlled substance, bribe receiving and petit larceny in August, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr., said.

The former 34th Precinct cop had a role in transporting a kilogram of cocaine from the Bronx to West 125th Street and Broadway in Harlem for $4,000. The alleged crooked cop got wrapped into the drug deal by a man he arrested in May, prosecutors said. Diaz believed the man was a drug dealer, but was actually an undercover cop who was investigating a tip that Diaz had been taking bribes, prosecutors said.

On June 15, Diaz helped the undercover officer transport cocaine by acting as his escort. Diaz drove behind the cop's vehicle and told him to drive slowly, to avoid talking on the phone and to tell any officer that stopped him to talk to Diaz, prosecutors said.

After the drug deal was successful, Diaz was recorded telling the undercover cop: "I can do life for this... I should know better. I'm a cop."

It's not quite life, but six years in state prison is a heavy sentence for a former police officer.

"The particular acts he committed – pocketing seized cash, accepting a bribe, and helping to transport cocaine – each undermined public safety in their own right," Vance said in a statement. "But more dangerously, his pattern of corruption jeopardized New Yorkers’ faith in law enforcement at a time when police and prosecutors are working proactively every day to increase public confidence in our work."

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