[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 135 (Friday, September 23, 1994)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E]
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[Congressional Record: September 23, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
           KEY DOCUMENTS PROVE INNOCENCE OF JOSEPH OCCHIPINTI

                                 ______


                      HON. JAMES A. TRAFICANT, JR.

                                of ohio

                    in the house of representatives

                       Friday, September 23, 1994

  Mr. TRAFICANT. Mr. Speaker, as part of my continuing efforts to bring 
to light all the facts in the case of former Immigration and 
Naturalization Service agent Joseph Occhipinti, I submit into the 
Record the transcript of an interview my chief of staff, Paul Marcone, 
conducted with New York City Police Department [NYPD] Sgt. Lenny Lemer. 
Present during the interview was NYPD Sgt. Robert Kwalwasser of the 
NYPD Legal Bureau.

          Interview With NYPD Sgt. Lenny Lemer, July 15, 1994

       Mr. Marcone. The first question I have is are you currently 
     a member of the New York City Drug Enforcement Agency Task 
     Force?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, I am.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. During your official duties with the 
     task force, did you at any time independently uncover 
     evidence that you would consider to be credible that there 
     may have been a conspiracy on the part of Dominican drug 
     lords in Manhattan to set up former Immigration and 
     Naturalization Service Agent Joseph Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, I uncovered some credible evidence that 
     there were some groups out there.
       Mr. Marcone. Dominicans?
       Mr. Lemer. Dominicans or Dominican descent, and there were 
     actually organized groups of I guess drug dealers in the 
     sense that had influenced, attempted to influence people in 
     the regard of Joseph Occhipinti.
       Mr. Marcone. Sgt. Lemer?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes.
       Mr. Marcone. When you make reference to credible evidence, 
     be more specific, okay?
       Mr. Lemer. Basically, I received information or we received 
     information about different, and organization that may have 
     been involved in having something to do with framing Joe 
     Occhipinti as well as several----
       Mr. Marcone. Excuse me. Is that the Federation of Dominican 
     Merchants and Industrialists?
       Mr. Lemer. It was the Federation of Dominican Businessmen 
     and Industrialists, right.
       Mr. Marcone. And these were witnesses that you were using 
     as informants?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, the original information that was relayed 
     to me actually came from what I believe at the time was a 
     source of information of an individual who apparently had 
     information who didn't want to be signed up as an informant.
       I later on, much later on, learned his identity after an 
     FBI investigation apparently involving myself and the 
     detective who had gotten the information, so at that point I 
     was told his name.
       At the time I received the information, first verbally and 
     then it was put in writing in a report dated July 10th of 
     1992, just subsequent to the riots up in Washington Heights.
       Mr. Marcone. What was the nature of the information that 
     you had?
       Mr. Lemer. The information that we had listed a number of 
     different grocery stores that were said to be run by people 
     selling drugs, as well as an organization, a corporation by 
     the name of Seacrest Trading.
       Mr. Kwalasser. Excuse me. At this point, we had talked 
     earlier, Mr. Marcone, that certain issues that were going to 
     be under investigation were not going to be discussed.
       Mr. Marcone. Right.
       So I can assume that Seacrest Trading is an entity that is 
     currently under investigation by NYPD?
       Mr. Kwalasser. Affirmative.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. I want to focus in on Occhipinti. Did 
     you, at any time through your investigations, as part of the 
     task force, receive any information that any of the 
     complainants against Occhipinti were coerced or bribed to 
     testify, to offer testimony against him?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, I did receive information, it turned out 
     to be what we call a blacklisted informant, a Dominican 
     informant who approached us, and when I did debrief him, said 
     to me that he had proof that Occhipinti had been in fact 
     framed and that the proof that he told me he had was that he 
     had taped apparently a couple of the witnesses who had 
     testified who had admitted that they had perjured themselves.
       Mr. Marcone. Were these the actual complainants, the Bodega 
     owners?
       Mr. Lemer. No. I don't recall if he was one of the Bodega 
     owners. He had mentioned one or two names of people who had 
     in fact apparently testified in the Occhipinti trial, and 
     subsequently he said that he had gotten together with them 
     and taped them and at which time they admitted to him that 
     they had received money from an individual by the name of 
     Jose Liberato, who owns numerous grocery stores in the 
     Washington Heights and Bronx area.
       Subsequently, we did look into Jose Liberato to a certain 
     extent, as well as some other grocery stores of whom 
     apparently there was a female who had testified in 
     Occhipinti's trial and ironically enough, thereafter, I found 
     out through checking with the Archives, the Journalist 
     Archives, that she apparently had given an interview to 
     Newsday regarding Occhipinti and I the quote was that he had 
     raided her store back in August of '89.
       A subsequent investigation by me as to who the owner was in 
     August of '89 came back to an individual by the name of 
     Freddie Then, who was, at that time, and actually who is 
     currently apparently a federal fugitive, having been 
     convicted, I believe, in the Southern District for cocaine 
     distribution.
       Mr. Marcone. Was he convicted in absentia?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, he was.
       Mr. Marcone. What happened?
       Mr. Lemer. What happened was apparently, in the last day of 
     the trial, just prior to the jury coming back, he jumped 
     bail. So that in effect the store changed names in October of 
     '89. However, that was my preliminary check.
       Mr. Marcone. Was there any indication that the 1989 raid 
     that Occhipinti made violated any laws?
       Were there any civil rights violations that she alluded to 
     in the Newsday article?
       Mr. Lemer. Apparently, we--I didn't, it was impossible for 
     me at that time to look into that actual raid or that arrest. 
     From the information that I was able to see, it appears that 
     the store was involved in some narcotics trafficking and as a 
     result, Freddie Then was arrested.
       The connection there being that when she admittedly says 
     that it's her store in '89, although officially the store 
     changes hands in October of '89 to I believe it's her 
     husband, Filo Crucey. And I wouldn't have known that had it 
     not been because she mentioned to that reporter that it was 
     her store in August of '89, which would have associated her 
     with Freddie Then, an obviously known drug dealer.
       Mr. Marcone. Is it safe to say then that you received 
     information from more than one source that Mr. Occhipinti may 
     have been set up by Dominican drug lords? Is that correct to 
     say?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, I received information from several 
     different sources, a lot of who were just informants or 
     actually not informants, sources who did say that he had been 
     set up because he was doing a lot of harm to the economic 
     business of the--well not so much necessarily only the drug 
     dealers but me experience with what we call the Bodegas, 
     which are the small grocery stores up in the Washington 
     Heights area is that in order to survive economically, they 
     have to rely on--a lot of times; I'm not going to say that 
     all of them but a good part of them rely on illegal 
     gambling, the Dominican lottery, the Dominican numbers, as 
     well as other means to subsist because if anybody were to 
     go up there and physically take a look at these places, 
     one would realize that it's impossible for four Bodegas to 
     exist on each corner of a particular block without having 
     to augment--I mean, you're looking at an area that's 
     economically deprived to a certain extent, and one would 
     say, well, they're doing these illegal activities to 
     augment their income, which is evident and has been 
     evident since I worked up there in 1982.
       So, I mean, when somebody, when a source of information----
       Mr. Marcone. Could you just kind of elaborate more on the 
     source. Are these confidential CIs that have been registered 
     by the department, or are they people that just talked to you 
     during the course of an investigation?
       Mr. Lemer. Most of them were just people that we spoke to 
     who we didn't really, who we didn't sign up.
       Mr. Marcone. Well, what were the circumstances for which 
     you were speaking to them? Was it in your office or was it on 
     the street?
       Mr. Lemer. No, no. Most of the time we would meet them up 
     in the Washington Heights area.
       Mr. Marcone. At what types of locations?
       Mr. Lemer. We'd--you know, on a street corner, we'd put 
     them in a car.
       Mr. Marcone. And talk to them?
       Mr. Lemer. Just talk to them.
       You see, we weren't really, I wasn't investigating whether 
     or not Occhipinti was or was not set up. I was investigating 
     other matters.
       Mr. Marcone. Related to drugs?
       Mr. Lemer. Foremost yes, related to drugs and whether or 
     not the information that we had been receiving that the riots 
     that occurred up there were in fact an organized venture by a 
     group of narcotics dealers who were trying to get the police 
     presence out of there.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. Was there any, did you ever come across 
     evidence that, in connection to the riots, that the 
     federation was involved in any way in trying to organize the 
     riots?
       Mr. Lemer. No, I did not. I didn't come up with any concise 
     information.
       Mr. Marcone. Relating to information that you uncovered 
     through these informants and discussions relative to a 
     possible set up of Occhipinti, did you report your findings 
     to anyone at NYPD or DEA and through the chain of command, 
     through officials reports?
       Mr. Lemer. No. Actually, the only report that actually 
     mentions the fact that Occhipinti may have been set up or 
     something to that effect was the original reported, dated 
     July 12th--July 10th, excuse me, 1992, which was the basis 
     for my group being formed, and which made a correlation 
     between, from the source of information between what had 
     happened to Joseph Occhipinti and what was being perceived at 
     that time as to what they were trying to do, or was being 
     tried to have done to Michael O'Keefe, who was the police 
     officer at the 34th Precinct who had shot the drug dealer and 
     basically supposedly precipitated the riots.
       But that was the only report that was ever written. You 
     know, we----
       Mr. Marcone. But Occhipinti's name was mentioned in that 
     report.
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, it was. His name was mentioned as it 
     related to the similarities between what had happened 
     there in his case and what was apparently happening in the 
     Michael O'Keefe case.
       Mr. Marcone.  Who compiled the report? Was it an NYPD 
     report or was it a joint NYPD/DEA report?
       Mr. Lemer.  It's a DEA report. We, working under the 
     auspices of the DEA task force, do DEA reports.
       Mr. Marcone. So it's considered a federal document?
       Mr. Lemer. That is correct.
       Mr. Marcone. To your knowledge, is the document considered 
     classified?
       Mr. Kwalasser. Do you normally--I just want to interrupt 
     one second--Sgt. Lemer, do you normally classify the 
     documents there? Or is that done by DEA analysts?
       Mr. Lemer. We would just write the report.
       Mr. Marcone. Who was the report written to?
       Mr. Lemer. The report is written actually to a general 
     file. It's just a report of information. It's actually, I 
     think it was titled ``The debriefing of a source of 
     information,'' I believe it was an eight-page report that 
     Detective Garrido wrote at my request.
       Mr. Marcone. And that report emotions Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, it does.
       Mr. Marcone. So you wouldn't play any role in tagging the 
     report as classified? You just submit the report and it will 
     be up to your superiors to determine whether or not a report 
     of that nature will be considered classified?
       Mr. Lemer. That is correct.
       Mr. Marcone. Because we, I want to state for the record 
     that we sent a Freedom of Information request to the DEA for 
     all files they had during that time period that you mentioned 
     that related to the Occhipinti case. And we did not get that 
     particular document.
       They did state that there were certain documents that they 
     had that they were not providing to us for security reasons.
       Is there anything in that report----
       Mr. Kwalasser. For the record, Mr. Marcone?
       Mr. Marcone. Yes?
       Mr. Kwalasser. Sgt. Lemer, when, in the normal course of 
     DEA Drug Enforcement Task Force business, there are times 
     when Sgt. Lemer has to answer--in other words, a Freedom of 
     Information request is made to the agency. Then the agency 
     will reach out to the various units within that. This is my 
     understanding, not being in the Drug Enforcement 
     Administration.
       This is the way it's been explained to me. The agency will 
     reach out to the field units to gather documents, and then 
     the agency records officer down in Washington makes the final 
     determination as to whether----
       Mr. Marcone. Right. I'm not questioning whether or not, I 
     have every confidence that all relevant documents are 
     forwarded to Washington.
       I just want to get, from Sgt. Lemer, his feelings as to 
     whether or not anything in the report, at this time frame, 
     will be considered classified or would it involve any on-
     going----
       Mr. Kwalasser. You're asking for an opinion, you're asking 
     Sgt. Lemer as to what someone else would determine.
       Mr. Marcone. How about this.
       Sgt. Lemer, was there anything in the report that made 
     reference to investigations that the NYPD DEA Task Force is 
     still currently engaged in?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, the reports referred to--I gathered the 
     reports. There were many reports that I did send to 
     Washington. Actually, the whole case file as well as the 
     memo that I discovered relating to Occhipinti.
       Mr. Marcone. But that was not provided. So a determination 
     must have been made at a higher level not to provide that?
       Mr. Lemer. It has to be made--I'd imagine I sent it to 
     the--at--Washington. They may be, I guess the final 
     determination as to what they would release.
       I did send whatever materials I had available.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay.
       Let's move on.
       In terms of the Occhipinti case, at any time, were you ever 
     told by a superior or any member of the task force to stop or 
     not to investigate any aspect of the Occhipinti case?
       Were you ever told by anyone not to investigate any further 
     on Occhipinti or any other matters that related to 
     Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, let me just clear this up probably from 
     its inception.
       I wasn't investigating Occhipinti.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay, I understand that, but at any point when 
     you mentioned Occhipinti in your reports, did anyone ever 
     come to you and say anything to you about the Occhipinti case 
     in terms of don't investigate this, or you're not supposed to 
     be investigating the Occhipinti case?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, a matter of course, when we first started, 
     okay, the thrust and my mandate was really to investigate 
     whether or not the allegations that were made initially 
     regarding all the criminal activity in the Washington Heights 
     area was in fact credible. And actually the idea was to stay 
     away from a direct investigation of whether or not Joseph 
     Occhipinti was guilty or not guilty.
       Mr. Marcone. Who made that determination?
       Mr. Lemer. That was made at the initial inception by the 
     powers that be, I guess the boss, you know, because of the 
     fact----
       Mr. Kwalasser. Mr. Marcone?
       Mr. Marcone. Yes?
       Mr. Kwalasser. Sgt. Lemer's task force was formed for a 
     specific purpose, okay? And while during the course of an 
     investigation, the task force might uncover other 
     information, but there are only a limited number of 
     individuals in the group, and they have to stay focused on 
     the mission, which was to investigate one item, and not to go 
     off in different directions.
       Mr. Marcone. I understand that.
       As a matter of practice, though, if, in the course of an 
     investigation that's focused on one issue, they uncover 
     evidence on another case, would it be normal practice for 
     them to turn over their findings to the relevant, either 
     federal, state, or local law enforcement entity to handle 
     that, or is that something that you would turn over to the 
     U.S. Attorney's office and say, we uncovered this evidence?
       Mr. Lemer. Let me say, as it related to the Joseph 
     Occhipinti situation, there was in reality no--I uncovered no 
     direct--well, at the time, let's say, because subsequent to 
     that in the earlier part of this year, I did uncover a DEA 
     memo which, in my estimation, shows a gross, well, shows that 
     something wasn't right as far as the investigation in the 
     Southern District as it related to a DEA agent who worked 
     among them.
       Mr. Marcone. Right. Now was that finding simply turned over 
     to DEA, or did you refer that to the U.S. Attorney's office 
     or the Office of Professional Responsibility inside the 
     Justice Department?
       Mr. Lemer. When I found this particular memo, which had 
     been written by a DEA special agent, after having spoken to 
     him verbally where he recounted to me what had happened in 
     1991, I really didn't know, to be honest with you, I didn't 
     know who to turn to because of the fact that the main focus 
     of the memo was the, well, I can't call it anything else, 
     apparent misconduct on the part of the Southern District of 
     New York.
       Mr. Kwalasser. Let's go back into perspective. If this is a 
     memo written by a DEA agent, it's already been filed. This is 
     part of the DEA's record. Sgt. Lemer just uncovered something 
     that he's assuming that DEA knew about also.
       Mr. Marcone. Right. So the memo was written from a DEA 
     agent to his superior?
       Mr. Lemer. That's correct.
       Mr. Marcone. If the DEA was aware of, let me just, I want 
     to focus for the record on what exactly, at the time, 1992, 
     is when you uncovered informants mentioning Occhipinti and 
     the fact that he may have been set up.
       At that time, what was the focus of the task force and what 
     were you exactly investigating, and what was the mission of 
     the task force, just so I know what your mission was.
       Mr. Lemer. My mission, or our mission was to investigate if 
     in fact the allegations that organized groups of narcotics 
     dealers were in fact responsible for fueling the riots, and 
     that was our primary focus.
       And what we tried to do was, as it related to the original 
     report of July 10th, which Detective Garrido wrote, which 
     had--the idea at the time was we needed to find out whether 
     or not the source of information was in fact credible. And in 
     order to do that, what we set out to do was take apart the 
     report, piece by piece, and see if in fact the allegations 
     against certain either businesses or individuals were 
     legitimate.
       And the way to do that was, and this is what we discussed 
     and the way to go about it, was to isolate each allegation 
     and see if in fact that person or place or corporation had 
     been or should have been a target of an investigation.
       And so that's what we--you know, we never looked into the--
     the Occhipinti situation was something that was nebulous to 
     us because there was no way for us to really look into 
     whether or not he was set up from what we were doing.
       In actuality, that was not our focus at all. We were 
     staying away from that because we needed to find out whether 
     or not a source of information was credible or legitimate.
       Mr. Marcone. On the riots?
       Mr. Lemer. On the riots because what happens is, if we were 
     able to determine that the allegations he made about 
     different companies or different people were in fact 
     legitimate, then one could surmise that the rest of his 
     information was also credible. That was the only way to 
     actually do that.
       We couldn't----
       Mr. Marcone. You and the task force, other members of the 
     task force would, as a matter of course, work very closely 
     with prosecutors, correct, in formulating a case?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, that is correct.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. In formulating a case, let's say you 
     found a pattern that there was an organized group that was in 
     fact responsible for the riots.
       Would you try to enter into evidence the fact that the same 
     group was responsible for organizing another type of effort 
     to frame a federal agent? And that would indicate a 
     pattern of illegal behavior? Or would that be considered 
     inadmissible?
       I know you're not a lawyer and you can't make that 
     determination, but is that something that you would try to 
     collect information of that nature and that would certainly 
     help your case?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes.
       You've got to realize, Mr. Marcone, a lot of the 
     information that you're getting is hearsay. You're getting 
     people's statements with no real factual corroborating 
     evidence.
       Mr. Marcone. What if you had sworn affidavits from 
     individuals?
       Mr. Lemer. I never had any, I never got any affidavits.
       Mr. Marcone. Were you aware of the fact that the Staten 
     Island Borought President's office did collect numerous sworn 
     affidavits from individuals that attest to the fact that 
     there was in fact a conspiracy to frame Mr. Occhipinti?
       Were you made aware of that fact?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, I became aware of that after our 
     investigation was pretty much coming to an end, and I was 
     apprised by Robert Knapp and Valerie Caproni.
       Let me just give you a little background.
       When it became apparent to me that a lot of the individuals 
     who I was looking at from an investigative perspective were--
     I became aware that the FBI had been tasked by apparently the 
     president, President Bush, at the time, to look into whether 
     or not there was wrongdoing in Occhipinit's situation.
       When I became aware of that, I said to myself, and 
     continued in that mode, that I needed to speak to those 
     agents so that they would know that I myself was doing an 
     investigation in which these people had been named and I 
     might in fact be looking at them from the drug aspect.
       In other words, were they in fact narcotics dealers, are 
     they in fact laundering narcotics money.
       And I went to the FBI because I didn't want to step on 
     their toes.
       Mr. Marcone. Are you talking about the investigation that 
     was initiated in July of '92 by the FBI?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes. Yes.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay, go ahead.
       Mr. Lemer. So I went to them and said to them that I had, 
     myself and the ASAC, my boss, and we had a meeting with the 
     agent who was running the investigation out in Queens, and 
     basically we explained our position, that we don't want to 
     step on their toes, and at the same time, I didn't want them 
     scaring my subjects into going underground.
       And at that point, I became aware that--this is subsequent 
     to speaking to that blacklisted informant--and then I became 
     aware that apparently there were tapes, and I was told by the 
     FBI that they had polygraphed the informant and that the 
     informant had failed the poly.
       And basically my answer to that was well, you know, I 
     haven't dealt with too many informants who could pass a poly.
       But the agent in charge of the organization did say to me, 
     because we were going to use this blacklisted informant at 
     the time, said to me that I could in fact use it. He'd failed 
     the poly but as far as he was concerned, I could go ahead and 
     use him.
       Mr. Kwalasser. Why don't you explain to Mr. Marcone what a 
     blacklisted informant really is.
       Mr. Lemer. A blacklisted informant is an informant that has 
     been registered prior and for any one of many reasons has 
     been deactivated for negative reasons.
       In this particular instance, the informant who contacted 
     us, and after relating his story, had said that he had been 
     blacklisted by the DEA, I looked at his file to see exactly 
     what the reasoning was, and spoke to the agents who had 
     controlled him.
       And from doing that little line, I found out that he had 
     been blacklisted for, you know, non--what I would consider 
     not a real serious reason. There are no real--in one 
     instance, apparently, was for failure to tell a U.S. Attorney 
     about somebody, a defendant. However, he had, once on the 
     stand had actually told the judge that what he'd done and was 
     found to be a credible witness and in fact the defendant was 
     convicted.
       Mr. Marcone. You had confidence in the witness?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes. I found him to be credible. I looked at his 
     file.
       Mr. Kwalasser. Just in total perspective, while the witness 
     might be credible and we might believe what he's saying, the 
     evidentiary value is very minimal because----
       Mr. Marcone. It's hearsay.
       Mr. Kwalasser. No. Even the witness, should he ever be 
     called to testify, is going to be shredded.
       Mr. Marcone. Is this the same witness who had information 
     about Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes. Right. It's the same one. And he had been 
     doing work for Mr. Molinari. So that's--and we were going to 
     utilize him because he was in fact going to be a good 
     informant for us.
       But then there was a problem where Mr. Molinari made a 
     phone call to Mr. Fox about--there was apparently a 
     misunderstanding that this particular informant had related 
     back to Mr. Molinari that the FBI was precluding us from 
     using him, which was not in fact the case.
       The FBI, after our meeting, had said, listen, he failed the 
     polygraph, we don't believe him, but if you want to use him, 
     go ahead and use him.
       But in total retrospect, that's telling you, we don't 
     believe him and, by the way, anything that he gives you, you 
     have to tell everyone that the FBI was going to use him but--
     --
       Mr. Marcone. So when you go to court, you really can't use 
     him?
       Mr. Lemer. You can't use him.
       Mr. Marcone. Although you could use him to get information 
     about other, other----
       Mr. Lemer. But you're risking people's lives with someone 
     that's not--would have been especially with the CI that has 
     been--in the past, would have been to corroborate and 
     investigate anything he said prior to us taking any kind of 
     proactive action.
       Mr. Marcone. And you can use an informant like that for 
     leads that would lead you to other informants who might be 
     more credible?
       Mr. Lemer. We had decided, at the time, and confirmed with 
     my bosses that we were in fact going to use him. It was only 
     that when it became apparent to us that the CI was going back 
     and reporting to Mr. Molinari and this particular instance, 
     it was not true, therefore we said it was more trouble than 
     it needed to be, and in fact we might end up hurting our own 
     credibility.
       Mr. Marcone. Let me ask you one more question about this 
     informant.
       In your opinion, did the FBI make a determination that the 
     said informant was not credible based entirely on the fact 
     that that informant failed a polygraph test?
       Or as far as you know?
       Mr. Lemer. My impression was that after he failed the 
     polygraph, they felt that he was lying.
       Mr. Marcone. So their impression of the informant was 
     based, was framed on--very heavily by the fact that he failed 
     the polygraph?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes. I don't know that, I mean----
       Mr. Marcone. But that was your impression, though?
       Mr. Lemer. That seemed to be, you know, and my question 
     then was, well, if I were to try to determine whether or not 
     a particular person was telling the truth, especially as it 
     related to audio tapes, as an investigator, the first thing I 
     would do would be, instead of giving him the poly, would be 
     to get an expert to do what we call a voice exemplar and 
     match and say, if this informant is saying that this Witness 
     X who testified in a trial told me that he lied, or that he 
     made it up because he was paid money, what I would do to 
     check the authenticity would be to have an expert say is this 
     in fact Witness X.
       I don't believe that that----
       Mr. Marcone. All right. One more question.
       In July 1992, the FBI----
       Is Sgt. Lemer there?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, this is me.
       Mr. Marcone. I want to pick on something.
       Your initial investigation in '92 was investigating whether 
     or not there were any organized groups behind the riots?
       Mr. Lemer. That was the primary thing.
       Mr. Marcone. Was that investigation ever concluded, and did 
     it result in any indictments?
       Mr. Lemer. No, it resulted in no indictments. We did get 
     information from an informant at the time that he was aware 
     of knowing what he considered drug dealers to him or paying 
     young street guys a hundred dollars to burn cars and continue 
     to fuel the riots.
       We never got any concrete proof of that, either from an 
     informant or on anybody, but that was what we determined. But 
     there wasn't enough to make any arrests or indict anybody.
       Mr. Marcone. You didn't have enough evidence to go to 
     indictment?
       Mr. Lemer. That's correct.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. At any point, did any other law 
     enforcement officers, from 1992 to the present, have any 
     other current active law enforcement officers ever come to 
     you and told you that they were either influenced or 
     intimidated by federal prosecutors not to investigate the 
     Occhipinti case?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, Detective Garrido, who worked for me, who 
     had authored the original report and gotten the information, 
     was called down to the Eastern District of New York and 
     questioned by the U.S. Attorney and the FBI, as well as 
     myself.
       And at the time, he was one defendant out of I believe what 
     was seven or eight in a civil case brought about by three 
     convicted drug dealers who were alleging that they were 
     beaten at the time of their arrest, I believe in 1988, and 
     the case was being handled by the U.S. Attorney's office in 
     the Southern District.
       He was, had prepared the case with the U.S. Attorney for 
     two years. We first became aware that the FBI and the Eastern 
     District was looking at any of this was, I believe it was the 
     beginning of '93, January of '93, when he was informed by the 
     U.S. Attorney handling his case that she could no longer 
     represent him because of a possible conflict of interest.
       She said that, when queried by him, she said she couldn't 
     divulge anything further because it was an ethical question.
       So I--through the records of DEA made attempts to find out 
     what was going on, and it became apparent that Frank Garrido, 
     Detective Garrido might be the subject of an investigation.
       Mr. Marcone. Related to Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. Related to, related to what we had been doing 
     and what we had probably, I don't know for sure, what we had 
     been doing as it related to the FBI investigation.
       What happened then was that the Department of Justice 
     authorized private counsel for Detective Garrido. However, 
     what happened was, obviously, if you're the only defendant in 
     one of these cases, sitting by yourself with private counsel 
     and everybody else has got the U.S. Attorney, one would look 
     around and say, there might be a problem.
       Mr. Marcone. Right.
       Mr. Lemer. So ultimately, the case was decided in about 48 
     minutes, I think, because the people making the lawsuit, the 
     convicted drug dealers apparently had--the injuries that they 
     claimed were proven to be from the high school. So there was 
     no merit to that case.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay, but were there any law enforcement 
     officers that ever came to you and told you that they were 
     either intimidated or influenced not to investigate the 
     Occhipinti case, any law enforcement officer that you are 
     aware of?
       Mr. Lemer. No, besides Frank Garrido and----
       Mr. Marcone. Was Detective Garrido, did he tell you that he 
     was intimidated or someone told him not to, I'm talking about 
     the Occhipinti case, do not investigate or push this case 
     further or maybe you shouldn't investigate this case?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, we both discussed what was going on, you 
     know, in relationship to their situation and my being called 
     down there, and we sat there and discussed it openly and we 
     looked at it and said, obviously, you know, if we continue 
     with this, nobody came out and said, nobody ever came out and 
     said, don't investigate this. The FBI didn't say it to me. 
     The U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District who was handling 
     it, the assistant didn't say it to me.
       However, I mean, we're not dumb either, and, you know, when 
     you see there's passive intimidation such that if you hit 
     your head against the wall long enough, maybe, you know, you 
     stop going in that direction.
       So we looked at it and said, if we want to be on the hot 
     seat, we'll continue to push this issue, and if we don't----
       Mr. Marcone. When you say on the hot seat, what do you mean 
     by that?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, to be scrutinized, to be called down to 
     the U.S. Attorney's office.
       Mr. Marcone. And when you're called down there, they 
     actually ask you questions about Occhipinti or was it?
       Mr. Lemer. They asked questions about Occhipinti, they 
     asked questions about----
       Mr. Marcone. They did ask questions about Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, yes.
       Mr. Marcone. And Molinari?
       Mr. Lemer. And Molinari.
       Mr. Marcone. What kind of questions did they ask you?
       Mr. Kwalasser. One second.
       Detective Lemer, was any of this information ever put 
     before a grand jury?
       Mr. Lemer. No, it was not. As far as I know.
       Mr. Kwalasser. Mr. Marcone, I'm just making sure that 
     there's no other violations.
       Mr. Lemer. As far as I know, it was never put into the 
     grand jury, but we were asked whether or not we knew Mr. 
     Molinari, whether or not--well, I can only attest to what I 
     was questioned about--whether or not I knew Joe Occhipinti.
       Mr. Marcone. And this was in when, in 1992?
       Mr. Lemer. Early 1993.
       Mr. Marcone. After the FBI completed its report?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, yes.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay, so this was in early 1993, and they're 
     asking you if you knew Joseph Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. They asked me if I knew Joseph Occhipinti, they 
     asked me if I knew Guy Molinari, and originally we went down 
     there, I went down there voluntarily, and they didn't 
     subpoena me or anything.
       I thought, my big thing was, plus the agent who was 
     investigating the case, Steve Jarrett, was the same agent who 
     was assigned to the original investigation back in July or 
     June of '92.
       Mr. Marcone. Getting back to Jarrett, we understand the FBI 
     began investigating the Occhipinti case in July of '92 to 
     determine whether or not Mr. Occhipinti's allegations had any 
     validity.
       You went to the FBI, or did they come to you?
       Mr. Lemer. They wouldn't have found me. I went to them.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. And were you interviewed by Special 
     Agent Jarrett during that investigation?
       Mr. Lemer. No, he was not present.
       It wasn't an interview actually. At that time, myself and 
     the----
       Mr. Marcone. What time frame is this?
       Mr. Lemer. This is in August.
       Mr. Marcone. Of '92?
       Mr. Lemer. Of '92.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay.
       Mr. Lemer. When I found out that the FBI had been tasked 
     with this investigation, I went to the Special Agent in 
     charge of DEA at the time, Mr. Bryden, who was familiar with 
     what I was doing there because he authorized my reassignment 
     to the task force on a temporary basis to investigate this.
       I spoke to him and asked him to call his counterpart in the 
     FBI and see if, you know, we could have a meeting because I 
     did not want to interfere with their investigation and at the 
     same time, I didn't want them interfering with my 
     investigation.
       Well, subsequently, we were given, I received a call from 
     Bob Knapp who is the agent in charge of the investigation and 
     we set up a meeting. It was a meeting, it wasn't an 
     interview, it was a meeting where I went there with my boss, 
     and Jarrett wasn't present that day.
       And he and I discussed what we were doing and at that time 
     was when he mentioned to me about this informant having 
     failed the polygraph.
       So I went to them in an open manner to say, listen, I'm 
     looking at these people for drugs, for narcotic and money 
     laundering violations.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. When you initially went to the FBI then, 
     Jarrett was not there?
       Mr. Lemer. No. He was assigned to the case because he----
       Mr. Marcone. Who did you meet with?
       Mr. Lemer. I met with Bob Knapp, Robert Knapp who was the 
     agent in charge of the case.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. And how did he react to the information? 
     You gave him obviously information you had about Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. Right.
       Mr. Marcone. What was his initial reaction?
       Mr. Lemer. He was very open-minded. He looked at it, and he 
     said--I explained to him as I explained to you earlier about 
     the grocery stores and how I've known that they conduct 
     illegal activities for years because of the economic 
     situation, and he said he wasn't from New York but, you know, 
     he could understand it, etcetera. He was very open.
       He said, as a matter of fact, he asked me, he said do you 
     want the transcripts of the trial. He says you can take a 
     look at them, and maybe that can help you. I said, and to 
     this date, I've never seen the transcripts of the trial nor 
     do I even know who exactly testified in that trial, other 
     than one or two people that I've learned about subsequently, 
     and one of them in particular related to this memo that this 
     DEA agent wrote.
       And I want to state for the record, Robert Knapp was a 
     gentleman and, you know, he was very open about everything, 
     and----
       Mr. Marcone. He was unbiased.
       Mr. Lemer. Unbiased.
       Mr. Marcone. You got the impression that he was simply 
     collecting information?
       Mr. Lemer. He was simply doing a case that he had been 
     tasked to do and nothing more and nothing less.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. Now under what circumstances did you 
     speak with FBI Special Agent Jarrett?
       Mr. Lemer. Shortly, I guess this was January, when I found 
     out----
       Mr. Marcone. January of '93?
       Mr. Lemer. '93.
       Mr. Marcone. And what were the circumstances that you ended 
     up speaking with him?
       Mr. Lemer. I called him to find out what exactly was going 
     on with Detective Garrido and also to tell him that I thought 
     we were doing a semi- a joint gentlemen's investigation. In 
     other words, we were doing ours and he was doing his, but it 
     was----
       Mr. Marcone. Were you aware in January of '93 that the FBI 
     concluded its investigation of the Occhipinti matter?
       Mr. Lemer. No, no.
       Mr. Marcone. So you were not aware that the investigation 
     had been completed?
       Mr. Lemer. I don't think so. I remember when I did find 
     out, it was because in the press they stated about the 
     report, that they wouldn't release the report. I don't know 
     when that was exactly.
       Mr. Marcone. It was December of '92.
       Mr. Lemer. All right, so I may have been aware of it.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay, now when you went with Jarrett?
       Mr. Lemer. I called Jarrett. He asked me to go to the 
     Eastern District.
       Mr. Marcone. Did you do that?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, I went down there basically voluntarily.
       Mr. Marcone. And who did you meet with?
       Mr. Lemer. I met with Steve Jarrett and Valerie Caproni, 
     the Assistant who at that time was handling the case.
       Mr. Marcone. Who is Ms. Caproni? Was she with the U.S. 
     Attorney's office?
       Mr. Lemer. She was with the U.S. Attorney's office in the 
     Eastern District.
       Mr. Marcone. And at that meeting, did you discuss the 
     Occhipinti case?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes. We discussed, I gave them the background. 
     Initially, I thought there was some sort of misunderstanding. 
     I said, obviously there's got to be a misunderstanding 
     because we're on the same side, at least I thought we were on 
     the same side.
       And at that, you know, and I started, I gave them a review 
     of the case. In other words, I told them how we were formed.
       They told me that they thought we were acting on our own 
     and I explained to them, I said, no, you know, I said Mr. 
     Bryden and we were put together by the Commissioner and we 
     were sanctioned by the Commissioner, at the time. Lee Brown.
       I said we don't just walk into the DEA and set up shop. I 
     said this was, and this was a legitimate investigation into 
     the events that occurred during the riots and them being 
     narcotics-related.
       Mr. Marcone. At any time, did Special Agent Jarrett, at 
     that meeting, pressure you in any way or try to intimidate 
     you by threatening an IAD investigation to terminate your 
     Occhipinti investigation?
       Mr. Lemer. No.
       Mr. Marcone. Or intimidate you or press you not to press 
     any further with the Occhipinti matter?
       Mr. Lemer. As I said, he never, he nor did Valerie Caproni 
     say anything that we should cease the investigation.
       They did ask me if I was still conducting the investigation 
     and at the time, we were in a lull because one of the main 
     witnesses had gotten killed.
       So I answered their questions and said----
       Mr. Marcone. One of your main witnesses in the--
     investigation?
       Mr. Lemer. No, one of the targets of our original. I guess 
     I'm not allowed to talked about it. There was a reason----
       Mr. Marcone. But the murder of the witness was not related 
     to the Occhipinti case?
       Mr. Kwalasser. No. I think it was related to an on-going 
     investigation.
       Mr. Marcone. So you were at a lull at that point.
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, I explained to him I was at a lull.
       Mr. Marcone. And did you explain, did you tell them, when 
     they asked you, did they ask you directly, are you still 
     investigating the Occhipinti case?
       Mr. Lemer. No. They asked me if I was still investigating 
     the Seacrest case.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay, but at any point, did either Jarrett or 
     Caproni ever mention Occhipinti at that meeting in January?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes. They asked me, I think they asked me if I 
     knew Occhipinti. As a matter of fact, they made some comments 
     about Occhipinti during, just at the end of the interview.
       Mr. Marcone. What kind of comments did they make about 
     Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. Very derogatory comments.
       At one point, towards the end, my attorney, my SBA, 
     Sergeant's Benevolent Association Union Attorney, who was 
     present with me, George Cerrone, I was giving them a 
     background basically as I said to you, and I said to Bob 
     Knapp at the time, I said, you know, have you been up to 
     the Heights, have you ever been up there to look around, 
     and about the economic situation.
       So my lawyer turned and said, well, I guess you can see, 
     plus I've worked in the Washington Heights area since 1982 on 
     patrol, and in narcotics as well. And I went back there as a 
     sergeant when I got promoted in June of 1992 and then was 
     reassigned after that back to the DEA to do this 
     investigation.
       But, so my lawyer turned to them and said, well, I guess 
     you can see, Sgt. Lemer is very well versed in the narcotics 
     goings on up in the Washington Heights area, and then Jarrett 
     turned around and said, no, he's not. Our number one expert 
     is Occhipinti.
       So then she turned around and said, well, the number one 
     expert that hasn't been indicted, you know, so to me, I took 
     offense at that.
       We were there as professionals, number one. Number two, I 
     was there voluntarily.
       Mr. Marcone. Did you construe that statement by Caproni as 
     trying to intimidate you not to, to lay off the Occhipinti 
     investigation?
       Did the impression that you get was that if you continue to 
     press, that these two would not be cooperative and that they 
     would cause problems for you?
       Mr. Lemer. Oh, definitely, definitely.
       Mr. Marcone. That was the impression that you got 
     personally?
       Mr. Lemer. Definitely. My personal impression was that they 
     were going to make my life as miserable as possible if I kept 
     pushing with this issue.
       And, you know, and the idea was that having, you know, 
     they, from the questions that they gave me, it became 
     apparent to me that they thought that I had something to do 
     with Mr. Molinari or that I was doing his--they had a copy of 
     the original report in their hand.
       Mr. Marcone. The 1992 report?
       Mr. Lemer. July 10th, 1992, in which Detective Garrido had 
     delineated all those allegations. They had a copy that was 
     unsigned and they kept asking questions about it, and I gave 
     them the explanation.
       So the fact that they had an unsigned copy meant, you know, 
     I realized that they had gotten that from the Southern 
     District because the only person I knew who had that unsigned 
     copy or was given an unsigned copy was Otto Obbermeier, who 
     was the U.S. Attorney for the district, and he was given a 
     copy of it by Bob Bryden who was the SAC, you know, so he 
     could see what was going on.
       Mr. Marcone. Did Special Agent Jarrett, either at that 
     meeting or any other meetings you might have had with him or 
     conversations that you had with him, make any derogatory 
     statements about either Mr. Occhipinti or Mr. Molinari?
       Mr. Lemer. He didn't make any derogatory about Mr. 
     Molinari. Occhipinti, as I said, it became evident to me, I'm 
     trying to think if I recall any other statements. That was 
     the first meeting.
       I had a second meeting and some things came up again. 
     Caproni was saying something about how, you know, Occhipinti 
     was a liar and how she had such disgust for--she even 
     mentioned some cops who would knock down doors illegally, 
     etcetera, etcetera, which I found, number one, quite 
     unprofessional, and number two, I was taken aback, because I 
     said, I was there to explain. I thought there was a perfect 
     explanation, and once they realized that this was----
       Apparently, they thought that this was something that was 
     not sanctioned and that we had been formed to get Joe 
     Occhipinti out of jail at the time, or to create some sort 
     of evidence that would show that Occhipinti was in fact 
     framed.
       And I explained it to them that that was not the case. But 
     they didn't want to hear it.
       Let me put it to you this way. Probably the most succinct 
     way that I can do it, and that is as an investigator, having 
     done many hundreds of investigations, I know that when I and 
     other prosecutors, you gather facts, okay. You gather facts 
     and the idea being that sometimes the facts are going to be 
     good for your case and sometimes they're going to be bad for 
     your case.
       It became evident to me that what they were doing in this 
     thing was that they had a predetermined theory or let's say a 
     puzzle all right, that they were filling in, and whatever I 
     said to them that didn't fit their puzzle, they just 
     disregarded.
       In other words, when I was giving them all this 
     information, I could look--they could care less, they weren't 
     even taking notes half the time.
       Mr. Marcone. When you mentioned things that could be 
     construed as exculpatory for Occhipinti, they did not take 
     notes?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, exculpatory for us, for me, in the sense 
     of that validated our investigation and therefore whatever we 
     had come up with. It became evident that they didn't want to 
     hear whatever facts, and there were facts.
       As a matter of fact, at one point, I had mentioned to them 
     that there was some evidence about--I looked at that July 
     10th report on the whole. As I said, there were many 
     allegations about many different people and companies that 
     were involved in illegal activity.
       And as I said, if nine out of ten allegations are fact-
     founded, one would surmise that the tenth is also founded, 
     okay.
       However, when I told them about one particular case, a part 
     of that report, where an allegation I found to be totally 
     correct, and it had been substantiated by the fact that DEA 
     in Bogota had executed search warrants on Columbian money 
     launderers and come up with hard evidence, paper work that 
     related back to this company, I explained that to them.
       They looked at me like I might as well have been talking to 
     the wall. And I said to them, I said, geez, they continued as 
     if this hadn't been documented. Apparently, they couldn't 
     find the file. They asked me if there was a file on this 
     case. I said there was.
       And they told me they couldn't find it. And I said, why 
     didn't you just ask me? I had no problem showing it to them.
       As a matter of fact, after the second meeting, I made 
     arrangements with Steve Jarrett and did show him the file 
     with the IAB lieutenant as well as showed him in the computer 
     system where the date of the entries, so that he would know 
     that the date of the entries were back in September of '92, 
     because I said to him that I didn't want him to think that I 
     back-dated any kind of report, all right.
       So it became evident to me that, I thought when I gave them 
     this concrete evidence, that they would say, my question was, 
     you're the FBI, there's a case here that begs to be----
       Mr. Marcone. When you say concrete evidence, concrete 
     evidence of what?
       Mr. Lemer. That this particular company was involved in 
     money laundering due to the fact that this information had 
     come out of Bogota, Colombia.
       Mr. Marcone. You did not give them any concrete evidence 
     relative to Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. No, no.
       Mr. Marcone. What you had on Occhipinti was basically 
     hearsay?
       Mr. Lemer. Correct.
       Mr. Marcone. But the hearsay could have been enough--in 
     other words, let's say you're conducting an investigation.
       Let me ask you a hypothetical.
       What if you superior said, I want you to go in an 
     investigate whether or not there was a conspiracy to indict 
     Occhipinti.
       You start investigating and you come back and say, well, I 
     have four or five witnesses who have hearsay evidence, but 
     would that be enough for you to investigate further, or would 
     they say, shut it down, you don't have enough?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, if you have four or five witnesses who 
     independently are telling you that something's going on, one 
     would continue. I mean, you'd be remiss if you walked away.
       Mr. Marcone. All right. A question here about the U.S. 
     Attorney's office.
       Mr. Lemer. Well, if I could just mention one thing?
       Mr. Marcone. Okay, good.
       Mr. Lemer. I asked, regarding this particular company that 
     was the subject of a big party of it, I wondered, why the FBI 
     wasn't investigating it. It seemed like to me it was tailor 
     made for an FBI investigation.
       Mr. Kwalasser. I think we're touching on something that we 
     probably should not really go into.
       Mr. Marcone. Is that because of the on-going investigation 
     of Seacrest?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, this is something about, you know, I guess 
     you could say that, that either relates to why they aren't 
     looking at it. Why is that Capronia and Jarrett never looked 
     at that company?
       Mr. Marcone. Right.
       Mr. Lemer. I asked that question, I mean----
       Mr. Marcone. What did they say?
       Mr. Lemer. No, I ask that question. I never asked them.
       I got a call from an FBI agent regarding Seacrest who told 
     me it was the best case he ever saw cross his desk, asking if 
     he could see my file.
       I got permission from DEA to show it to him. The next thing 
     you know, he never called me again. He disappeared off the 
     face of the earth.
       Mr. Marcone. For the record, I'm aware of the fact that 
     there is an on-going investigation of Seacrest. I'm also 
     aware of the fact that there have been several investigations 
     at several levels that we terminated, and my purpose here 
     today is not Seacrest. I may be in the future, but I'm here 
     on Occhipinti and I'd like to focus in on that.
       I understand what you're saying about Seacrest.
       Were you, subsequent to your January '93 meeting with 
     Special Agent Jarrett and Attorney Caproni, since that time, 
     have you ever had any discussions or meetings with anyone 
     from the U.S. Attorney's office, either of the Southern 
     District or the Eastern District, regarding Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. I believe, I have it written down too, later on 
     in '93, I was called and asked to go back down to the Eastern 
     District.
       Mr. Marcone. Who called you?
       Mr. Lemer. Steve Jarrett called me, the agent.
       Mr. Marcone. And this was regarding Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. Regarding the whole situation, and there was a 
     new U.S. Attorney assigned to the case. Faith Gaye was her 
     name.
       And let me see, I have----
       Mr. Marcone. Did you actually go down to the Eastern 
     District and meet with them?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, I went down there and met with Faith Gaye 
     and Steve Jarrett again.
       Mr. Marcone. What was the nature of the--what was discussed 
     at the meeting relative to Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, they wanted to know, one of the things 
     that came up was, Jarrett had said that, asked me if I had, 
     you know, since I had spoken to him last, if I had met with 
     or met either Molinari or Occhipinti.
       So my answer to that was that, yes, I had.
       And so then they asked me--okay, hold on a second----
       (Pause.) I'm looking at some notes. My date was wrong on 
     the first meeting. It's actually March 3rd of '93 that I met 
     with Caproni and Jarrett for the first time.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. So this is a good three months after 
     they had issued their final report?
       Mr. Lemer. Right.
       Mr. Marcone. When did this second meeting take place?
       Mr. Lemer. August 23rd.
       Mr. Marcone. Of '93?
       Mr. Lemer. Of '93--excuse me--'93, correct.
       Mr. Marcone. Of '93.
       And at that point, they asked you questions about whether 
     or not you had met with Molinari and Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. Right.
       Mr. Marcone. What else did they ask you?
       Mr. Lemer. Well, they asked me whether I was still 
     investigating the case or not. And I told them, no, that at 
     that time that I----
       Mr. Marcone. Whether or not you were investigating the 
     Occhipinti case?
       Mr. Lemer. No, Seacrest.
       Mr. Marcone. Did they ever mention Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. No, no. They never actually came out and said 
     that they thought I was investigating Occhipinti.
       Mr. Marcone. At the August '93 meeting, did they mention 
     Occhipinti at all?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes. They asked me, they asked me if I met with 
     them, and I said that I met him at a foundation, Michael 
     Buczek Foundation dinner, which was in early May. When I told 
     them, then Jarrett said, oh, you mean the Joseph Occhipinti 
     legal defense fund?
       And I said, no, I don't mean that. I said, I know exactly 
     what I mean. I said I was introduced to Joseph Occhipinti at 
     the Michael Buczek Foundation dinner. He was there and so was 
     Mrs. Molinari. I met both of them.
       So then he says, well, the Joseph Occhipinti Fund Dinner 
     was maybe like a week later. And I said, no, I was----
       And he says, did you attend that?
       I said, no, I didn't, you know, but everything was, you 
     know, as if I was in bed with Joe Occhipinti, you know, and--
     --
       Mr. Marcone. In terms of when the conversation turned to 
     the Occhipinti matter, did you feel that they were, that 
     Jarrett was being coercive or intimidating to you relative to 
     that particular matter?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, oh, yes.
       He was----
       Mr. Marcone. Was he hostile?
       Mr. Lemer. Not really. He's not that type. He was just, you 
     know, he wasn't hostile, you know, he just asked me--the 
     way he put it, making comments. You made a comment at the 
     first meeting about the riots when I had said that I was 
     assigned to investigate the thing about the riots, he 
     says, oh, he was trying to pinpoint the date, he said, oh, 
     was that the day the Lieutenant threw the guy off the 
     roof?
       And I looked at him and said, what are you talking about? I 
     said it was, you know, as a matter of fact, you know, it was 
     made clear that that wasn't the case in that particular 
     instance, and as a matter of fact, the FBI was the one they 
     rappelled off the roof because Bob Knapp told me that when I 
     first met him. I mean, Bob Knapp was a gentleman.
       You know, so when he made that comment to me, it became 
     obvious that they were being hostile. That was when we sat 
     down. So I said, obviously, you know, this is not a meeting 
     of fellow professionals, that's for sure.
       Mr. Marcone. What else did they ask you at the August 1993 
     meeting about Occhipinti, other than whether or not you had 
     met with Occhipinti and Molinari, did they ask you any other 
     questions?
       Did they ask you if you were still investigating the 
     Occhipinti case?
       Mr. Lemer. They asked me if my group, if I still had my 
     group, and I told them no, that my group had been disbanded.
       So they said you're doing regular work now?
       I said, yes, I'm assigned to the DEA task force in a 
     regular group doing regular narcotics cases.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. Did they say anything further about the 
     Occhipinti case at that meeting?
       Mr. Lemer. About the Occhipinti case?
       Mr. Marcone. Yes.
       Mr. Lemer. They just went over some things about how my 
     group was formed and all that, and then they asked me, I said 
     to them that, you know, Lee Brown had sanctioned it, that 
     then Commissioner Ray Kelly was the first Deputy at that 
     time, and then the U.S. Attorney said well, I should put you 
     all in the Grand Jury.
       And I said, whatever, that's your prerogative, whatever you 
     wish.
       I was trying to explain to them that this was, you know, 
     that we were doing a legitimate investigation and we weren't 
     there, we were not there to investigate Joseph Occhipinti as 
     to whether or not he was clean or not. That was not our 
     function, and that's not what we did.
       You know, if something had come up, and I told him that, if 
     something had come up that showed any kind of exculpatory 
     type of factual evidence, we would have, you know, done 
     something or we would have passed it along, but that was not 
     our objective, and it definitely wasn't our mission.
       Mr. Marcone. I only have two more questions. This question 
     has to do with the Federation of Dominican Businessmen and 
     Industrialists.
       In the course of your work with the task force, have you 
     ever come across credible evidence that key members of the 
     Federation--and by key members, I would mean Board members--
     were involved in drug distribution and money laundering?
       Mr. Lemer. In December of '92, I interviewed a defendant, 
     okay, who was cooperating who was a past president of the 
     Federation of Dominican Businessmen and Industrialists.
       At that time, he was out on the street wearing an ankle 
     bracelet and he was going to become a witness for the 
     prosecution in a major drug case.
       At that time, I asked him about Seacrest Trading. I asked 
     him about the Federation and what they did, et cetera. He had 
     said that he was a past president, that he wasn't involved 
     any longer, et cetera.
       I never specifically asked him about the Federation. I did 
     basically ask him whether or not they were legitimate, okay. 
     And he said that he wasn't involved with them any longer, 
     that he'd had some sort of a falling out--well, it seemed to 
     point, substantiated that one of the original companies that 
     I was investigating in the original report was in fact loan 
     sharking. And he explained to me precisely how they went 
     about it.
       And at that point, I couldn't speak to him any longer 
     because he hadn't signed a cooperation agreement and the U.S. 
     Attorney said she didn't want to get into a position where he 
     would later on not sign the agreement but yet go to the judge 
     and say, I did this and I did this.
       So we held off and two weeks later, he was shot and killed 
     in front of his office.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. Are you saying that, yes, you did have 
     evidence, credible evidence that members of the Federation 
     were involved in----
       Mr. Lemer. Well, no, I didn't. He never came out 
     specifically and said it, but I was going to leave that for 
     another time and there was no other time.
       Mr. Marcone. Did you ever indict--were indictments ever 
     handed down against any Federation members?
       Mr. Lemer. No, there weren't.
       Mr. Marcone. Did you ever come across any evidence that any 
     of the complainants in the Occhipinti case were engaged in 
     illegal activity?
       I'll give you one specific name and maybe make it easier.
       Did you ever come across any credible evidence, or are you 
     aware of any indictments that were made against one Jose 
     Liberato?
       Mr. Lemer. No. No, there were none.
       Mr. Marcone. Never indicted?
       Mr. Lemer. No, he was never indicted. A close family member 
     was for narcotics and I believe it was narcotics. I don't 
     think it was money laundering. It was definitely narcotics. 
     His brother was and his other brother apparently was arrested 
     for gambling.
       Mr. Marcone. Have you ever spoken to any law enforcement 
     officials at any level that believed or told you that they 
     had evidence that there was in fact a conspiracy by the 
     Dominican drug cartel to frame Mr. Occhipinti?
       Mr. Lemer. I spoke to one DEA agent who provided me 
     verbally with information that in 1991, he became aware that 
     the Southern District of New York, while conducting their 
     grand jury investigation, had a witness testify, who had in 
     fact perjured himself, and to that end, he notified them 
     having been at a particular incident, he was in prison when 
     it was alleged that Occhipinti had searched both the person's 
     store, this guy Richard Knipping, or Nipping, Richard's store 
     and his home.
       And the DEA agent said when he----
       Mr. Marcone. Was the DEA agent's name John Dowd?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay.
       Mr. Lemer. Yes. When he was present at the Southern 
     District and he read the indictment, this post-indictment, he 
     saw these two counts which related to this particular date 
     and these particular events, he told the two investigators 
     that that did not in fact occur.
       And they apparently said to him that, how did he know, he 
     wasn't there.
       He then informed them that he was in fact there along with 
     an IRS agent as well, and that not only had they received 
     permission to search the individual's store and that they 
     hadn't searched the individual's apartment because he had 
     invited them to get his passport and at no time had they 
     searched his apartment.
       Their answer to him was, well, are you sure you were there.
       He said did something happen in the elevator, and the 
     agent, John Dowd, said, yes, there was some powder on the 
     floor, soap powder, and I made the comment that, Geez, look 
     at the building you live in, there's even stuff on the floor. 
     And they all chuckled about it.
       And then they responded, oh, you were there, in total 
     amazement, and so he said, yes. He said, and none of this is 
     true.
       Mr. Marcone. As far as you know, were the charges against 
     Mr. Knipping dropped, the charges that that particular part 
     of the indictment, was that subsequently dropped?
       Mr. Lemer. Those two counts of the indictment were dropped 
     and John Dowd to this date, asked me, he said, if they were 
     dropped, number one, why wasn't he charged with perjury? It's 
     obvious he lied to the grand jury.
       And number two, was anybody informed about this? Dowd kept 
     saying he expected somebody to call him because he had gone 
     on a couple of these things with them and he realized that if 
     this one individual had perjured himself, and nobody had 
     bothered to check, you know, as a matter of fact, John Dowd 
     mentioned to me that he had said to the two investigators, 
     why don't you check with the people who are present at these 
     things.
       And they said, their answer to him was something to the 
     effect well, you know the blue wall of silence we get. We 
     can't count on that.
       Mr. Marcone. How long have you been a law enforcement 
     officer?
       Mr. Lemer. Twelve and a half years.
       Mr. Marcone. Prior to Mr. Occhipinti's indictment, were you 
     ever aware of an instance where a law enforcement officer was 
     indicted and tried on charges related to illegal search and 
     seizure?
       Mr. Lemer. No. As a matter of fact, it's my understanding 
     that this is the first law enforcement officer ever brought 
     up on those charges.
       Mr. Kwalasser. Let's qualify that to remain that it's Sgt. 
     Lemer's knowledge, not----
       Mr. Lemer. Right.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay, that should be recorded.
       In your experience, how normally is a charge of illegal 
     search handled?
       Is it handled administratively, and within the New York 
     City Police Department, how would they, if they had evidence 
     that an officer had illegally obtained information in a 
     search, how is that normally handled, in your experience?
       Mr. Kwalasser. Well, I don't think Sgt. Lemer's in a 
     position to answer that.
       Mr. Marcone. Well, I'll withdraw that.
       I have a question about this--have you been contacted by a 
     superior or any official who told you not to cooperate with 
     this particular Congressional investigation?
       Mr. Lemer. No.
       Mr. Marcone. No. Okay.
       The only other question I have is have you ever been 
     involved in an instance where you worked closely with the 
     U.S. Attorney's office on an indictment of an individual?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes. In the course of my normal business, I 
     normally either work closely with a U.S. Attorney, an 
     Assistant U.S. Attorney or a district attorney.
       Mr. Marcone. And is it your experience in investigations of 
     illegal activity by an individual that it is standard 
     practice, before an indictment is handed down, for the U.S. 
     Attorney's office to interview all potential witnesses who 
     may have actually witnessed an illegal act?
       In other words, let me pose a hypothetical.
       Let's say you're investigating someone for dealing drugs 
     and this person has dealt drugs on 20 different occasions.
       Would it be standard procedure for the U.S. Attorney's 
     office, in your experience, for them to interview any 
     witnesses that they are made aware of, prior to the 
     indictment, that may have witnessed the individual performing 
     the illegal act?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes, that's standard procedure.
       Mr. Marcone. They would interview every witness that they 
     were aware of?
       Mr. Kwalasser. Now you're asking Sgt. Lemer in his own 
     experience.
       Mr. Lemer. I can only say that I would interview.
       Mr. Marcone. But you would consider that to be good law 
     enforcement?
       Mr. Lemer. Yes.
       As an investigator, I would interview everybody that I felt 
     had information.
       Mr. Marcone. And according to DEA Agent Dowd, that was not 
     done in the Occhipinti case?
       Mr. Lemer. No. According to John Dowd, as a matter of fact, 
     he made mention of it to me specifically that he made mention 
     of it to them, that that hadn't been done obviously in this 
     case.
       Mr. Marcone. That law enforcement officers who accompanied 
     Mr. Occhipinti on many of these searches in question, that 
     were direct eye witnesses to the incident, were never 
     interviewed by the U.S. Attorney's office?
       Mr. Lemer. That is correct.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay. At this point, this is all the questions 
     I have. Okay?
       Mr. Lemer. Okay.
       Mr. Marcone. All right. I appreciate your time, and like I 
     said, I will make a transcript of this entire interview, and 
     I will send both you and Sgt. Kawlasser a draft of it, and 
     ask you to make any corrections, and to look at it before we 
     actually make it a final copy of the transcript.
       Mr. Lemer. Okay, fine.
       Mr. Kwalasser. Is this going to be edited into the record?
       Mr. Marcone. We don't know yet. Certainly we'd like to take 
     a look at the transcript and I would say that there's a good 
     chance that we might insert this into the Congressional 
     Record.
       Mr. Lemer. Mr. Marcone, I just want to make it clear that 
     we were in fact not investigating Occhipinti.
       Mr. Marcone. Right.
       Mr. Lemer. And so, and we never came up with any concrete 
     information or evidence that he was in fact framed. Just 
     that, you know, through different sources who now a lot of 
     them are not available, and then all the other instances, as 
     I've delineated them to you.
       Mr. Marcone. But from what I gather, from what you've told 
     me today, that in the course of your investigation, which had 
     nothing to do with the Occhipinti case, some of the people 
     you spoke to voluntarily offered information concerning the 
     Occhipinti case and the information they offered me was 
     hearsay evidence, but nonetheless they voluntarily came 
     forward with evidence and information that Occhipinti may 
     have been the victim of a Dominican drug cartel conspiracy?
       Is that correct?
       Mr. Lemer. That is correct, yes.
       Mr. Marcone. Okay, that's all I have.
       Thank you very much.
       Mr. Lemer. Okay, Mr. Marcone.
       (Whereupon, the interview with Mr. Lemer was concluded.)