Officer charged in theft of marijuana

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A Middletown police officer was formally charged last week with stealing confiscated marijuana from the police station, the attorney general's office confirmed yesterday.

Michael Braley, 42, has been charged with one felony and two misdemeanors: committing a prohibited act by a law enforcement official, larceny under $500, and obstructing a police officer. A third charge, possession of marijuana, was dropped because the four bags of the drug that were taken from an evidence box in the station house were never found, according to Jerry Coyne, deputy attorney general. The bags were believed to be discarded, officials have said.

Citing the police officers' bill of rights, the new Middletown police chief, Anthony Pesare, would not comment on Braley's future with the department, other than to confirm that Braley was still suspended with pay. He added that Middletown was cooperating with the investigation.

"We're going to be working in conjunction with the attorney general's office and the state police in the criminal prosecution," Pesare said.

Braley had served as a Middletown police officer for 11 years when he was arrested on June 11 after a state police investigation into the missing marijuana. Providence Journal records show he graduated from the Rhode Island Municipal Police Academy in 1993.

Last week's decision was something of a legal formality, allowing prosecutors to move Braley's case from District Court to Superior Court, where he is expected to be arraigned Sept. 9, Coyne said.

The third charge was dropped because the evidence was never found, Coyne said, and a possession charge requires a positive identification of the substance.

"Unless you recover them, you'll never be able to prove what it was," he said.

The charges against Braley were the result of a state police investigation into the marijuana, which was discovered missing from locked evidence boxes. The drugs had been confiscated during the May 16 arrest of a Newport man, James A. Aguiar, after a fight on West Main Road. Charges against Aguiar had to be dropped after the evidence was stolen, resulting in the obstruction charge against Braley, Coyne said yesterday.

The Providence Journal
By JENNY HOLLAND
September 1, 2004
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