Public defender seeks to dismiss 26 Phila. drug cases
Philadelphia's Public Defender today petitioned the courts to dismiss charges or grant new trial to another 26 persons convicted on drug charges - all allegedly arrested based on false information by veteran narcotics Officer Jeffrey Cujdik and his paid confidential informant.
Philadelphia's Public Defender today petitioned the courts to dismiss charges or grant new trial to another 26 persons convicted on drug charges - all allegedly arrested based on false information by veteran narcotics Officer Jeffrey Cujdik and his paid confidential informant.
Together with 24 petitions filed on April 3 and three last Wednesday, today's filings will bring to 53 the number of people whose convictions could ultimately be dismissed.
As with the earlier petitions, the filings in Common Pleas Court today bring contend that the cases - most of which resulted in guilty pleas - are tainted by allegations by Cujdik's former paid informant, Ventura "Benny" Martinez. Martinez, in a Feb. 9 interview with the Daily News, said he and Cujdik often falsified information to convince judges to sign search and arrest warrants for drug suspects.
Had information about the alleged conduct by Cujdik and Martinez been known, Assistant Public Defender Bradley S. Bridge argued in court papers, the defendants would have been acquitted or chosen not to plead guilty.
Arguing for a new trial, Bridge wrote that, to do otherwise, "the untenable alternative is that an innocent man would continue to be in state prison and on state parole for several more years."
The District Attorney's office has gone on record in two court filings arguing that it is premature to take any action involving involving the convictions of those arrested through the work of Cujdik and Martinez.
No action should be taken, the city prosecutor argued, until the results of investigations of the allegations by the city and the FBI are known.
Cujdik, 34, a 12-year veteran, has surrendered his service weapon and since late January has been assigned to desk duty. He is the only member of the Narcotics Field Unit police officials have reassigned.
Cujdik has not commented publicly on the allegations made by Martinez - with whom he worked building drug cases for almost eight years - but he has been backed by Philadelphia's Lodge 5 of the Fraternal Order of Police. Cujdik's attorney, George Bochetto, has called Martinez a career criminal and a liar who incriminated Cujdik out of anger.
Bridge filed his first 24 petitions on April 3 under Pennsylvania's Post Conviction Relief Act, a secondary appeal law that allows a judge to reopen a criminal case based on evidence discovered after conviction that could call the verdict or guilty plea into question.
Bridge said that today's filings are likely the last he files based on Martinez's allegations in the Feb. 9 article. Bridge said state law requires that petitions based on after-discovered evidence be filed within 60 days of the date the information becomes known to the defense attorney.
At the heart of the challenged cases is Martinez's allegation that Cujdik and he would contrive information about drug activity to convinced a judge to issue a search and seizure warrant for a person Cujdik believed to be a dealer.
Cujdik's hugely productive relationship with Martinez, 47, came undone last October when Martinez's identity was disclosed in court by the lawyer and investigator for a defendant whose criminal case the informant helped Cujdik develop.
Martinez was also photographed leaving a Kensington rowhouse owned by Cujdik and leased to a woman who was the informant's girlfriend and mother of two of his children.
Martinez said he went to the newspaper after his request for protection and relocation were rebuffed by authorities.
