| On August 17, 2006, Officer Andrew Collins of the Benton Harbor Police Department in Michigan arrested Christopher Moore and charged him with possession of less than 50 grams of heroin with intent to distribute.
Moore pled guilty to the charge in Berrien County Circuit Court on September 25, 2006. He was given probation, placed on house arrest, required to pay $1,700 in court costs and fees, perform community service, and comply with several other court orders.
On January 17, 2007, Moore was found in violation of his probation, and he was sentenced to 180 days in jail, with credit for 31 days.
In February 2008, Collins was fired after a supervisor found a lockbox under a desk that contained cocaine, heroin and marijuana. The cocaine was already packaged in small baggies. Collins was indicted on a single count of drug possession by a federal grand jury on November 26, 2008. Corporal Bernard Hall Jr., his supervisor, was indicted on July 16, 2009 on three counts: conspiracy to violate civil rights, giving false declaration to a grand jury, and giving a false statement to the FBI.
After the indictments, Berrien County Prosecutor Arthur Cotter began reviewing cases where Collins and Hall were the arresting officers. A judge granted a motion to vacate Moore’s conviction and dismiss his charge on September 21, 2011. Approximately 65 defendants had their convictions vacated based on misconduct by Collins and Hall.
Collins pled guilty in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan on January 26, 2009 to his single possession count. He was sentenced to 37 months in prison. Hall pled guilty in U.S. District Court on August 25, 2009 to the conspiracy charge and was later sentenced to 30 months in prison.
Collins testified at Hall’s sentencing hearing that he and Hall embezzled from the police department by receiving reimbursement for drug buys that never happened. They also began taking money from defendants, and then under-reporting the amount of cash recovered in the evidence reports.
“I think it got to the point where we would talk about it,” Collins said. “So I asked him, I said, ‘Do you think God cares if this is drug money that we are stealing?’ And he kind of, you know, shook his head and said, ‘I know, I know, it’s been hitting me too.’ We both said, ‘let’s stop, let’s stop, let’s start doing things right.’ Then, you know, just the addiction to the money, the next person we would arrest would have a couple thousand dollars on him, and we would take money from him. It just kept happening that way. We would try to stop, and then we wouldn’t.”
In the wake of the scandal, Moore and 84 plaintiffs – some whose charges were dismissed prior to trial – filed lawsuits against Collins, Hall, and the city of Benton Harbor.
Court records suggest about 90 percent of the plaintiffs settled their lawsuits. Most of the settlements, including the amount received by Moore have not been publicly disclosed, although the handful that have been made public range between $28,800 and $176,160.
– Ken Otterbourg
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