RAW FULL VIDEO Police planting drugs UTICA NY

Police chief defends handling of evidence in video

UTICA — Local police officials say its acceptable practice for officers to place drug evidence in their pockets while searching a suspect.

A local NAACP official, however, questions whether such methods create the potential for tampering.

Just 24 hours after a video titled "Utica, NY police planting evidence" went viral across the Internet, Utica police Chief Mark Williams was forced to explain the ambiguous actions of one officer caught on tape during traffic stop in February 2011.

As the public has reacted with outcries of corruption since Monday, Williams released the entire 30-minute recording to show all of the circumstances surrounding an incident in which he believes no wrong occurred.

The earlier online video snippet -- lasting 1 minute and 40 seconds -- shows Utica police Officer Paul Paladino pull a full, clear plastic baggie from his pocket before leaning into a vehicle stopped at the intersection of Clinton and Kemble streets.

After about 25 seconds, Paladino walks away from the vehicle with similar-looking baggies in his hand, according to footage from the dash-cam of Paladino's police vehicle.

Minutes before Paladino enters the rear passenger side of the vehicle, the footage shows him removing similar looking baggies from the pockets of handcuffed suspect Grady Jones, 51.

The search of Jones' passenger, Ameya Hunt, 38, was not recorded on film. But Williams said seven baggies of marijuana were recovered from her purse, in addition to 10 baggies of marijuana from Jones. The scent of burnt marijuana also could be smelled coming from the vehicle, and a blunt cigarette was found, police said.

The shorter controversial segment of the footage, Williams said, actually shows Paladino later removing those same baggies of marijuana from his pocket so that he could separate them in the backseat of Jones' vehicle.

Under the driver and passenger seats, Paladino also recovered other plastic baggies that contained a small residue of cocaine, resulting in misdemeanor charges, Williams said.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• Police Video
• Cops
• NAACP
• Drugs

[t2t3456]

In the video it does appear something white was found in the pockets of the suspect. These white items appear to have been put on top of police car. Then he proceeds to the suspects vehicle and after a while comes out from the front of said vehicle and proceeds to go to the back seat. Upon entering the back seat he seems to go into his back pocket an produce a bigger white bag. You can make anything of this. But a bigger bag produces a bigger sentencing and maybe this is where the plant is...

[askiaf]

9:15 you will see the mother fucker take drugsout his pocket and put it in the car. that cop deserves to be silenced.

[MadtimeCA]

/watch?v=H9WoIsSXh0k&feature=c­hannel_video_title

[oovalen]

8:50 :::: TAKTE HER AWAY , WE CAN'T FIND ANYTHING!! put here in the car so i can wipe my fingerprints of this evidence i am going to plant....

dear god in heaven what can we do with these individuals?!?

[oovalen]

flip to 9:10 ....o my dear god ...

[mmsibi]

@Catalysis24

Racial inadequacies? Please elaborate....

[YoungWiz40]

911 views? hmmmm weird

[jordypoe]

@shagadelic28 An officer putting a bag of drugs in their pocket is suspicious to say the least. Everything on youtube is inflammatory. I sincerely doubt all the "UFO PROOF" is legit. This video would not have been taken seriously if the officer followed procedure and didn't do dumb stuff. Other questions come after that like how did a non-police officer get their hands on this video? There were many mistakes but it all starts with protocol. We do train these people after all.

[shagadelic28]

@jordypoe the problem did not arise from the procedure...the problem arose when someone saw an opportunity to smear cops for doing their jobs, by editing a video and giving it an inflammatory title.

[shagadelic28]

people should be upset not over the cop storing evidence in his pocket, but over the inflammatory and libelous attempt by the NAACP to give the officers a bad name by posting an edited video and making allegations they knew were untrue...I hope the cops sue the NAACP for libel and slander.