Drug trafficker cuts deal to cooperate in court

For years, Ricardo McKendrick Jr. said yesterday, he sold drugs - cocaine - "in bulk" to major Philadelphia narcotics traffickers.

The deals, he admitted, made him lots of money.

When he and his father were arrested in April, police seized more than 600 pounds of cocaine valued at more than $28 million. They also grabbed more than $1 million in cash that the younger McKendrick had stashed in two cars he owned.

Now, looking to get out from under a potential life sentence, McKendrick might have cut his biggest deal of all.

In a move that could have a major impact in the Philadelphia drug underworld, he has become a cooperating witness for the federal government.

The soft-spoken 37-year-old made his debut yesterday as he took the stand in the trial of former Philadelphia Police Officer Malik Snell, who has been charged with using his badge to rob drug dealers.

But it is what McKendrick is saying about fellow narcotics traffickers that could be of most value to law enforcement. And that information is still a closely guarded federal secret.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Kathy A. Stark, one of the prosecutors in the Snell case, questioned McKendrick about his 12-page plea agreement shortly after he took the stand yesterday morning before U.S. District Judge R. Barclay Surrick and a jury of 10 men and two women.

But Stark did not enter the agreement as evidence, thereby keeping it out of the public record.

To date, prosecutors and McKendrick's defense attorney have declined to talk about it, even though reports that he has cut a deal have been swirling around underworld and law enforcement circles for three months.

Federal authorities would not even confirm that McKendrick was a witness until he was called to the stand yesterday.

McKendrick and his father, Ricardo Sr., have been described as "suppliers to the suppliers." Both men pleaded guilty to federal drug-trafficking charges in December, but only the younger McKendrick is believed to be cooperating.

McKendrick, who is facing a maximum sentence of life imprisonment in his drug case, said he hoped his cooperation would result in substantially less jail time.

Under the terms of his cooperating agreement, McKendrick said, he must "tell the government about any crime I've done . . . any crime I've committed personally or have personal knowledge of."

Law enforcement sources have said that if McKendrick has agreed to tell all - as his plea agreement seems to indicate - the impact would be felt up and down the city's drug-distribution ladder.

At the time authorities arrested the McKendricks in April and seized the 600 pounds of cocaine in their Grays Ferry rowhouse, police described it as one of the biggest drug seizures in Philadelphia history.

Two questions that McKendrick has no doubt already been asked are who shipped the cocaine to Philadelphia and to whom did he and his father intend to sell it.

Investigative sources have indicated that the shipment came from Atlanta and that one of the McKendricks' key customers was a South Philadelphia-based drug dealer who has been the target of a joint federal-city investigation for several years.

McKendrick, however, spent most of his time on the witness stand yesterday testifying about his alleged role as a crime victim rather than a drug dealer.

He has told authorities that Snell, driving a car equipped with flashing lights and a police radio, pulled him over in December 2007 and took $150 he had in his pocket and $40,000 he had in a diaper bag in the backseat of the minivan he was driving.

McKendrick said Snell then left him handcuffed and sitting on the curb near the corner of Dickinson and Water Streets in South Philadelphia.

The robbery occurred about 11:30 a.m., he said.

McKendrick said that in his original reports to police, he did not mention the $40,000 because "I didn't want to call attention to myself."

At the time of the robbery, he said, he was not sure whether Snell was really a police officer or merely posing as one. A few days later, he said, he saw a newspaper story about Snell being arrested in connection with a botched home invasion in Pottstown. The story included a photo of the then-police officer.

Snell, who was assigned to the 18th District in West Philadelphia, was fired shortly after his arrest in the home-invasion case. A trial in October ended in a hung jury.

Authorities expanded the charges against the suspected rogue officer after McKendrick and other alleged drug dealers began cooperating against him.

Snell has denied the charges, which include conspiracy, robbery, and threatening witnesses.

The trial is expected to last about a week.

Snell's defense attorney, John McMahon, told the jury in his opening statement on Monday that the prosecution's case was built around the tainted testimony of admitted drug dealers.

During his cross-examination, McMahon pointed out that McKendrick had told a grand jury that Snell brandished an automatic weapon while robbing him. Yet from the witness stand yesterday, McKendrick said repeatedly that he never had seen any gun, just a "bulge" under the windbreaker that Snell was wearing.

Asked whether he had lied to the grand jury, McKendrick said he had "testified to the best of my recollection."