Jenkins was given a 25-year prison sentence on June 7, 2018, which he is currently in the midst of serving at a federal prison in Kentucky. Gillian Whitfield recalled Jenkins as sweet and always willing to lend a hand. In my conversation with Jenkins, he spent a lot of time disputing Stepp's account of their partnership. De Sousa handled the discipline, and they had worked a deal, Hill said, according to a transcript of the interview. Near Druid Hill Park, amid the shouting, sirens and buzzing choppers overhead, he commandeered a state prison department van and helped pull injured officers inside. Wayne Jenkins was living a double life. Baltimore can be a complicated and dangerous place, and the men and women the officers targeted and abused may have caused harm and abuse themselves. But then, about an hour later, the phone rings again. "I'm in prison for 25 years, there's no reason to lie.". At the time, Stepp was running his own bail bond company, Double D Bail Bonds. The two police officers came over because they had nothing else to do.. Wayne Jenkins, who . Prior to this, they'd been lauded as some of the best gun cops in the city - seizing dozens of illegal firearms every month, and demonstrating a "a work ethic that is beyond reproach", in the words of one supervisor. In September 2021, Jenkins spoke with BBC journalist. He idolizes this guy, said Shelley Glenn, another prosecutor. On June 7, 2018, he was sentenced to 25 years in prison. The second declined to comment. She said she found Hersl in particular to be very credible.. It turned out that federal agents had the unit under surveillance for months. Then they spilled out of the house and onto the sidewalk, struggling. You will not be charged for this call. In 2018, Jessica wrote a piece which detailed the explosive trial at a Baltimore federal courthouse that revealed the unit's crimes, She then turned that story into a new seven-part podcast series called Bad Cops which you can listen to in its entirety below. In our conversation, Jenkins says that that's not true - members of the squad did steal money that day, but from somewhere else in the house. From 2006 to 2009, Jenkins was the subject of at least four lawsuits alleging misconduct. 3.4M views, 20K likes, 1.4K loves, 6.8K comments, 52K shares, Facebook Watch Videos from The Baltimore Sun: A criminal with a badge: A Baltimore Sun investigation into the story of Baltimore Police. Right away I learn that Jenkins is an incredibly fast talker. It's propped up on top of a suitcase sitting on top of a plastic tub, and I'm holding my recorder and microphone at the ready. At trial, Jenkins and his boss denied any knowledge of who attacked OConnor. He said he started dealing drugs at age 9, selling. Wayne Jenkins, Baltimore's dirtiest cop, is sentenced: It still doesn't feel like justice Jenkins was supposed to get guns off the street in Baltimore but wound up running a vicious. To learn more about their behavior, The Sun obtained several thousand pages of court records, dozens of body camera videos and hundreds of police department emails and restricted internal files. Read about our approach to external linking. He's also at work on a memoir, which he says will reveal the contents of videos and photos he took of Jenkins that were never released publicly. On the citys west side, officers were being pelted with bricks; some were hurt. His promotion required him to return to uniformed patrol for a time, and he was assigned to the Northeastern District. I continued working on this story for as long as I did out of some hope that the more the public learned about the corruption in the police department, the better chance there might be of some kind of true, systemic reform. Jenkins lied to them, saying he was a federal agent. I did give drugs to Donny [Stepp, who testified he and Jenkins sold $1 million worth of narcotics] for the last couple of years I was police, but I didn't take people's money because then they would know you were dirty. The leaked case file doesnt say why. But the police departments Internal Affairs office still had an open file on the case. One former supervisor never responded. "It shows what a committed, sophisticated, devious person can do," Mr Wise said. Far from it. Burley was sentenced to 15 years in prison, which he was serving until federal prosecutors uncovered the task force's corruption and freed him. I couldn't help thinking about the many victims of the squad that I'd met over the three years I've been working on this story. Credit: Baltimore Police Department, Its a Viking mentality: You go out into the field among the bad guys, and you bring back a bounty. Contact Justin Fenton at jfenton@baltsun.com. Sergeant Wayne Jenkins, along with Detectives Marcus Taylor and Maurice Ward, intercepted a drug deal at the Belvedere Towers in Baltimore and seized about 20 to 25 pounds of marijuana as well as $20,000 to $25,000 in a second bag. During his trial, on January 5, 2018, Jenkins pled guilty to one count of racketeering, two counts of robbery, one count of destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in a federal investigation, and four counts of deprivation of rights under color of law. Former Baltimore Police Sgt. He's opening a consulting service called Stepp Right Consultants, to give guidance and insight to men and women who are about to enter the federal penal system. It was his first public appearance since he was arrested along with six other officers last year. OConnor had spent much of the day tossing back beers at the Brewers Hill Pub & Grill in Southeast Baltimore when the manager asked him to leave. "I just go through this on a daily basis, scared of police, wondering when they gonna stop you, trying to plant drugs on you or something like that. "He's like, 'I'm not telling you to do anything, I'm just saying it sure would be nice if we had $10,000 apiece to go up to Atlantic City,'" Jenkins recalls. Until this point, I'd only heard Jenkins on secretly taped FBI recordings, wiretapped phone calls, body camera footage and at the hearing in June 2018 when a federal judge sentenced him to 25 years in prison. But Davis, Baltimores police commissioner from 2015 to 2018 and a veteran of two other departments, calls plainclothes units necessary and critical to the crime fight. They go looking for guns and drugs, he said, and often are successful. Washington (AFP) - A police officer described as perhaps the most corrupt in the history of the Baltimore police department was sentenced to 25 years in prison on Thursday. After outlining this, Ward said, Jenkins reconsidered. Turmoil has continued at the Baltimore Police Department, an agency that saw four commissioners in little more than a year among them De Sousa, now in prison for tax fraud. When his case went to trial on January 5, 2018 Jenkins pled guilty to one count of racketeering, two counts of robbery, one count of destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in a federal investigation, and four counts of deprivation of rights under color of law. "Later on that evening, Gondo did give me money, that means hours later, I'm talking hours later, he gave me money.". More than 50 people including current and former police officers, prosecutors, defense attorneys and victims were interviewed. But overall, plaintiffs prevailed in at least three lawsuits accusing Jenkins of beatings or other misconduct from 2006 to 2009, resulting in $90,000 in taxpayer payouts. He resigned and the top spot at the Baltimore Police Department remains vacant. Jenkins pleaded guilty in January and admitted taking part in at least 10 robberies of Baltimore citizens, planting drugs on innocent people and re-selling drugs he stole from suspects on an almost daily basis, including heroin, cocaine and prescription painkillers. Many plainclothes units would work out of a satellite office inside a trailer in Northwest Baltimore. He had a criminal case to fight, and his freedom was more important. Jenkins, indignant, aggressively shot back at questions from OConnors attorney. Jenkins joined the Baltimore Police Department (BPD) on February 20, 2003 and was promoted to Sergeant on November 20, 2013. Today, he's a free man, living without restrictions with his spouse and young daughter in the eastern part of Baltimore County. "It strikes at the foundation of our entire criminal justice system.". Stepp testified that the arrangement was so lucrative, he stuck with it for years before getting arrested himself in December 2017. "It was obvious to me, when I'm taking millions of dollars worth of drugs from the Baltimore Police Department and selling them, that this is not a normal police department.". However, he was also sued for misconduct before his arrest in 2017. Just as she was completing her podcast series on the story, she got a very unexpected call from prison. Then 34, he was already an admired leader of aggressive street squads and would go on to head the elite Gun Trace Task Force, one of the Baltimore. I wasnt privy. Within days, prosecutors issued a letter to police saying they were declining to charge Jenkins with a crime. If Wayne Jenkins asked you to come work for him, you felt honored, Ward said. Wayne was a cops cop, local hero kind of guy, said Cirello, the retired officer. During his time on the streets of Baltimore Jenkins was involved in several arrests that resulted in the injuries of the people he took into custody. But Jenkins wanted to argue the details in his plea agreement, saying many of them weren't true. HBO asked Stepp to be a consultant on the project, which he enthusiastically agreed to do. Jenkins, along with Detective Ben Frieman, had followed an African American man driving a nice car through Northeast Baltimore. "You have nightmares about police officers harassing you, beating you up, just locking you up, it's just a nightmare that I have and it basically hasn't gone away yet," he said. But they needed more information. I never heard back, and he didn't seem to be responding to anyone else, either. He had been stationed in North Carolina and would frequently make trips home to visit his family and his high school sweetheart Kristy, the . And in the midst of that investigation, another arose. He. It took place as Jenkins and other officers were searching an apartment. It was billed at the time as the largest cocaine seizure in department history, one of Jenkins many large-scale seizures. In court, Ward apologised to the victims, to his family and to the Baltimore Police Department, as well as to his co-defendants. They direct their work, approve overtime pay and provide reports to higher-ranking supervisors. No one took anything, but Jenkins later mused about the possibilities. It was there that the full extent of the officers' misconduct became public. That creates a culture its not unique to Baltimore, but its pronounced here that those guys should be given a pass, Davis said. "Obviously I'm in here now, so I see both sides. He gave me a few reasons. I have to try to untangle his answers as he moves from subject to subject, sometimes so fast I can't keep up. In a 26 page letter hand written from his cell at the Federal Corrections institution in South Carolina, former Baltimore Police Sergeant Wayne Jenkins tells a judge that he saved a . Some of his men also have acknowledged stealing well before they came together on the Gun Trace Task Force in 2016. Just in recent weeks, two officers have been criminally charged with misconduct. Hill said in the interview that De Sousa reduced the punishment to verbal counseling in effect, no punishment at all. In the years since his arrest, he'd never given a public interview. "It's still hard though, because I get a lot of pain in my mouth at night. BALTIMORE The Baltimore City Board of Estimates paid out a $6 million settlement Wednesday to the family of a bystander who died during a police chase by the . Join half a million readers enjoying Newsweek's free newsletters, L-R: Former Baltimore police Sergeant Wayne Jenkins, and Jon Bernthal as Jenkins in HBO true-crime drama "We Own This City. Jenkins is currently in prison. "He is no more than a common criminal," Davis' daughter, Shirley Johnson, said of Jenkins. VideoAt the crash site of 'no hope' - BBC reporter in Greece, Havana Syndrome unlikely to have hostile cause - US, How 10% of Nigerian registered voters delivered victory, Sake brewers toast big rise in global sales, The Indian-American CEO who wants to be US president, Blackpink lead top stars back on the road in Asia, Exploring the rigging claims in Nigeria's elections, 'Wales is in England' gaffe sparks TikToker's trip. Wayne Jenkins in prison,. Can this US city go 72 hours without a murder? Baltimore leaders have agreed to pay a $6 million settlement to the family of a driver who was killed during a 2010 police chase involving Gun Trace Task Force officers. Despite the lawsuits and later, video evidence from his squads body cameras Jenkins supervisors failed to scrutinize the arrests he was making. Jenkins started calling Stepp to the scenes of arrests, encouraging Stepp to try to get inside drug dealer's hideouts to steal whatever cash or narcotics he could find. Sergeant Wayne. Just how long ago Jenkins began stealing isnt clear. While he may not be ready to let go of his animus towards Jenkins, Stepp's strange journey seems - at least for now - to be heading towards a happy ending. It feels a little bit like splitting hairs. In an interview from prison, he said it wasnt uncommon for the officers to take contraband and submit it to evidence control without arresting someone. In federal prison, inmates are only allowed to talk on the phone for 15 minutes before the line is automatically cut. "He's never been a true friend," Stepp says. Then 34, he was already an admired leader of aggressive street squads and would go on to head the elite Gun Trace Task Force, one of the Baltimore Police Departments go-to assets in the fight against violent crime. His fee will be donated to the victims of the Gun Trace Task Force. "Nobody still knows the truth about what's going on in the city," Taylor told the judge. He was serving his sentence at the Edgefield Federal Correctional Facility in South Carolina until 2020. Several of the former officers also took the stand - now wearing prison jumpsuits instead of uniforms - and detailed the tactics encouraged by their leader, Jenkins. I just knew it was a lie, Ward recalls. "an inmate in a federal prison," the robot finishes. Please sign up today and help make a difference. That while the homicide rate was on a historic rise, this elite, eight-officer team was getting guns off the streets at an astonishing rate. HBO's new true-crime drama stars Jon Bernthal as Jenkins, with the show examining Jenkins' rise in the city's police department and eventual arrest after a two-year federal investigation into the GTTF. Some defense attorneys say their clients told them Jenkins had robbed them. "Immediately, we get together and you go over your story. But, he added, I think that if I am held responsible for my actions, then the same should be with the officers for their wrongdoing.. But I think he also spoke to me because he doesn't like the image of himself that's been in the media - as a sociopath, as someone almost inhumanly evil. Inside was a stack of bills. During hia time in the department, Jenkins was involved in numerous arrests . Another was to talk about how futile life inside the penal system is. Jenkins must serve three years of supervised release after his custodial sentence. Many Baltimore residents had long distrusted the police, and more so after the death of Freddie Gray. Why cant I be like this guy?. "Absolutely. By Justin Fenton June 12, 2019 More in the series Part 1 The rise of Wayne. They said he prepared an arsenal of weapons and tools to begin carrying out burglaries. There's no telling how many other people were affected, but were too afraid to come forward. Here's what the public was led to believe about the Gun Trace Task Force, before the FBI arrested almost every member of the squad: That in a city still reeling from the civil unrest that followed the 2015 death of Freddie Gray in police custody, the GTTF was a bright spot in a department under a dark cloud. Jenkins was stationed in North Carolina but often made the long trip back home to Middle River. "Seen it done, honest to god, 500 times.". Used to tell me he won it playing poker.". Correction 11 June 2018: This article has been amended to make clear that prosecutors pointed to how 1,700 criminal cases have been affected by the unit's corruption. Theres been plenty of times where the suspect has said, The drugs are in the car, and I go and I cant find them. Dan Horgan said his mentality was your typical Marine camaraderie, teamwork. Yes. But Internal Affairs was still working on the case that the States Attorneys Office had decided it could not pursue: the suspicion that Jenkins might have planted drugs in a car to justify an arrest. Such questions over integrity have in the past prompted prosecutors to stop calling an officer as a witness, forcing the departments hand to take him off the streets. They weren't being paid by the taxpayers to keep the city safe, and weren't operating with all the power and protections that police have. By Josiah Bates. Shawn Whiting, a man whose house was robbed of $16,000 and a kilo-and-a-half of heroin, testified that he knew that as a drug dealer, his word counted for much less than the officers'. Over his tenure, he was. 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