$100,000 cash bail for cop in ‘ice’ case

Superior Court Associate Judge Teresa Kim-Tenorio increased yesterday to $100,000 the initial $25,000 cash bail that the court had imposed on Police Officer 1 Carl Kohler Tudela, who was arrested Friday night for allegedly buying methamphetamine or “ice.”

Tudela, 38, who is assigned with the Department of Public Safety’s Patrol Section, was taken to Superior Court yesterday on charges of possession of a controlled substance and misconduct in public office.

If Tudela makes bail, he will be subjected to a daily 7pm to 7am curfew and required to have no contact with any places or people involved in the case.

Preliminary hearing will be on March 17 at 1:30pm.

Assistant public defender Michael Sato was appointed as counsel for Tudela.

Chief Prosecutor Leonardo Rapadas moved to increase the bail amount considering that Tudela is a law enforcer and because of the seriousness of the charges.

Office of the Attorney General investigator George F. David stated in his report that the OAG Investigation Division, Drug Enforcement Agency Task Force, and the Department of Public Safety’s Criminal Bureau of Investigation jointly investigated Tudela’s drug activities on Wednesday.

David said the information they gathered indicated that Tudela’s activities involve smoking and purchasing “ice” while on or off duty.

David said the joint team’s investigators met with a cooperating source on Friday at 7am to prepare for a “control-reverse” operation against Tudela.

The cooperating source allegedly previously sold “ice” to Tudela and had witnessed the officer purchasing drugs from another known meth distributor about two months prior.

David said their operation involved having the cooperating source meet with Tudela to talk about “ice” and to determine if he was willing to buy “ice.”

At 8:30am Friday, investigators began surveillance at the SH Apartment in San Antonio, just north of San Antonio Elementary School, where the officer stays in one of the rooms.

The cooperating source had allegedly previously accompanied another meth distributor who had sold “ice” to the suspect at his apartment.

At 8:40am, the cooperating source met with Tudela at the staircase of the apartment building and asked him if he wants to buy “ice.” The officer allegedly told the cooperating source to wait as he would ask his girlfriend for some money.

David said Tudela later handed an undetermined amount of cash to the cooperating source, who then gave him a small plastic baggie containing a substance purported to be “ice.”

David said the detectives later met with the cooperating source and retrieved the electronic recording device and $17 that Tudela gave to the cooperating source as payment.

At 8:13pm, the joint team served Tudela with an arrest warrant and searched his apartment unit.

According to court records, Tudela had a trafficking of a controlled substance case in Superior Court but it was disposed in December 2000. Saipan Tribune has yet to see the records to determine what happened to that case.

‘Police officers are good’

In a news briefing yesterday afternoon, DPS Commissioner James C. Deleon Guerrero assured the public that most police officers are good and are not engaged in this type of drug activities.

“It is unfortunate when somebody gets involved, especially with drug-related activities, because it tarnishes the reputation of the department as a whole,” he said.

Deleon Guerrero disclosed that he has already terminated about five police officers for drug-related activities.

He said more DPS personnel were also just released internally, based on sufficient information that they gathered to proceed with administrative actions.

Deleon Guerrero said he’s been quite aware for some time now that Tudela was engaged in drug-related activities. In fact, he said, it was a DPS detective who discovered Tudela’s activities as part of an investigation into a criminal incident.

He said it was brought to his attention and one of the things suggested was to bring the matter to the AGID to investigate the matter further.

“We allowed the AGID to perform the investigation as opposed to DPS, given the fact that it does involve one of our employees,” the commissioner said.

Deleon Guerrero said Tudela has been employed with DPS since 2008 and assigned with the Patrol Section.

He said at the time of the arrest, Tudela was off duty.

In a statement yesterday, Chief Prosecutor Rapadas said: “The people of the Commonwealth should rest assured that the majority of police officers serving them are good, hardworking public servants. Our office will continue to work with those dedicated officers with this and other future cases.”

The public is reminded that the charges are allegations at this time and that all persons are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.