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NEW BEDFORD — After the Boston Globe published its series on egregious misconduct by the city’s narcotics unit regarding its use of confidential informants, the New Bedford Police Department came out in March with a lengthy “For the Record” page, in which it issued point-by-point rebuttals.
The department wrote that then-Chief Paul Oliveira in 2023 had directed a previously unpublicized investigation “into the general workings of the narcotics unit to ensure it was operating within policy and law.” The review concluded that the unit was “operating within policy and law,” NBPD’s page states.
But the investigative report shows that a department investigator devoted only two sentences to the question of whether the narcotics unit was following procedures. The investigator reached his conclusion that the unit was following policy without much, if any, explanation amid the more than 130-page, partially redacted document.
The 2023 report, provided in response to a public records request by The Light, had been ordered after earlier revelations by the Globe about misconduct with the confidential informant system, including how an officer, Jean Lopez (who now works for Westport police), had attributed “intentionally and knowingly false” information to a confidential informant in his filing for a search warrant, per a judge.
The first of this two-part investigation was into Lopez, while Oliveira ordered the second part of the investigation to evaluate “practices of the narcotics unit and to make certain that the confidential informant policy (General order 5-02) was being adhered to,” the report states.
The investigator conducted only two interviews: one with Lopez (11 minutes long); and the other with Lopez’s partner in narcotics (which only lasted five minutes). The questioning was limited to a controlled buy and arrest led by Lopez.
Read the redacted investigative report ⇢
The 10-page confidential informant policy establishes the many rules officers must follow, including documentation they must submit and get approved by supervisors, how to conduct themselves with informants of the opposite sex, how to register an informant (and what would make a person ineligible), how the unit must be audited for its use of informants, and how funds disbursed must be reviewed and documented.
But on the broader investigation, the report makes reference only to the controlled buy aspect of the policy, stating, “The record keeping of controlled buys conducted by the Narcotics Division are accurate.”
The conclusion is otherwise vague: “There is no evidence uncovered in this investigation to suggest that the New Bedford Police Department’s Narcotics Division is not adhering to the department’s confidential informant policy.” Beyond the scope of the Lopez investigation, the report does not go into any detail on the other aspects of the policy — whether it be the registration, reliability, potential misuse or protection of informants.
Within the report, there is little evidence the internal affairs unit evaluated the conduct of the other members who make up the narcotics division, also known as OCIB (Organized Crime Intelligence Bureau). The report reviews case-specific documents for the Lopez inquiry (affidavit, arrest report, police narratives), but it includes not much, if any, discussion or documentation on the unit as a whole.
The city’s 138-page report includes the investigator’s 10-page summary of the investigation against Lopez, as well as several appendices. (The city withheld 32 pages of court transcripts of a hearing regarding Lopez’s alleged misconduct. Elsewhere, sections or sentences were redacted.) It addresses the overall narcotics unit in two sentences on the summary’s last page.
The police department’s “For the Record” page cited its 2023 investigation in its response to a March 13 Globe article that had claimed Oliveira, as chief, had “shown little interest in making reforms to departmental policy even in the face of abuses,” and that “New Bedford police abused the confidential informant system in almost every way imaginable.”
Oliveira retired May 3. He defended the department’s performance in a recent interview with Light columnist Jack Spillane.
Risks with confidential informant systems still a question in New Bedford
Months after internal affairs completed this investigation, a consulting firm, Jensen Hughes, released a report on the department that touched on risks with confidential informant systems.
The firm, which was paid more than $120,000, said the department’s system presents a “real danger” if it is not closely monitored, and recommended that the department “regularly review the use of confidential informants,” review the policy annually, and audit all confidential informants to “ensure they have not been involved in any criminal acts.”
Police oversight experts measure the quality of an internal affairs unit through several aspects.
This includes evaluating the thoroughness of investigations and interviews, and whether or not they are perfunctory. Additionally, experts assess whether the unit is not only gathering all relevant documentary evidence for the initial issue, but also for additional allegations that may arise during the course of the investigation.
Further, experts say that investigative reports should provide perspective on what evidence was gathered and how they evaluated the evidence in light of the allegations.
The internal affairs unit is currently being reviewed by Chicago-based firm 21CP Solutions, along with the narcotics unit. In March, in response to the Globe’s series “Snitch City,” Mayor Jon Mitchell said the department had hired a “highly respected internal affairs expert to take a deeper dive.”
The review is expected to take about 90 days, according to the city.
The city has not disclosed how much it is paying 21CP and a contracted expert with the firm to investigate these units. City solicitor Eric Jaikes said the agreement is privileged.
“The Agreement is a contract between the City and an educating expert seeking advice in anticipation of potential litigation and is therefore privileged,” Jaikes wrote in an email last month. “Also it is exempt [from] disclosure … because it is ongoing deliberative process.”
The Globe last week sued the City of New Bedford, along with Worcester, Boston, Springfield and Massachusetts State Police, for public records on confidential informant systems.
In response to questions from The Light on Monday about the thoroughness of this 2023 investigation into the narcotics unit and its compliance with the informant policy, Assistant Deputy Chief Scott Carola said that NBPD “stands by” the review and conclusion.
Carola also pointed to the other reviews of the department.
“The NBPD embraces the ongoing work of Jensen Hughes, a nationally recognized public safety consultancy that is examining the entire department to improve operations across the board,” Carola said by email, also referencing the ongoing “independent evaluation” by 21CP into confidential informants and the internal affairs unit.
Email Anastasia E. Lennon at alennon@newbedfordlight.org.
We dina do nuffin.
I don’t trust anything from the city and especially NBPD or Deputy Scott Corola who just lost a sexual harassment case against Former Ofc Makaila Saunders (related to John Saunders) !!!!!
What a sad joke that this is the response by the city of New Bedford to decades of out of control lawlessness! Police chief “running off” into retirement two and a half years before his current contract expires?? Why sure everyone leaves a half million free dollars on the table. Business as usual in good ole new beige
The abuse and misconduct, brought to light in the past few years of the Narcotics unit, raise the obvious question of what else they may be doing illegally.
And Oliveira’s “investigation”? Give me a break. This makes the whole department look like an embarrassment.