3-headed nightmare
Ex-L.I. cop tells of vengeful trio of lawmen & abuse coverup
The three top Suffolk County law enforcers called themselves “The Administration” — and few on Long Island had the nerve to take them on.
Disgraced ex-Suffolk Police Lt. James Hickey, testifying Tuesday in the federal corruption trial of ex-Suffolk County District Attorney Thomas Spota and his protege Christopher McPartland, recalled how the two lawyers teamed with county Police Chief James Burke to forge a powerful and menacing alliance.
“If you crossed one, you crossed all and you made sworn enemies out of three of the most powerful men in Suffolk County,” said Hickey, the former head of the Suffolk criminal intelligence division. “They would destroy you professionally. They would go after my men, my family. They knew no bounds.”
Spota, 78, and former DA’s office deputy McPartland, 53, stand accused of obstruction of justice and witness tampering over a 2012 incident in which Burke, 55, punched a handcuffed man who broke into the chief’s police vehicle.
The suspect fled with a duffel bag embarrassingly filled with sex toys, a
Viagra prescription, pornography, a gun belt and magazines of ammunition.
Hickey, 55, testified in a Central Islip courtroom about a Dec. 12, 2012, phone call where the police chief asked for county detectives to investigate the humiliating robbery. Once suspect Christopher Loeb, 32, was in custody, recalled Hickey, things started to go sideways.
“Burke told me that the … detectives did themselves proud,” testified Hickey, who pleaded guilty in 2016 to a coverup of the ugly police payback. “They beat the hell out of Christopher Loeb. [Burke] was very pleased that day.”
Hickey later heard that Loeb’s interrogation included one detective choking he suspect, another slamming his head against a table and a hird urinating into he man’s coffee cup. Prosecutors alleged the suspect was handcuffed and shackled to the floor during the beatdown.
According to Hickey, the coverup was launched the next month when word of an FBI investigation into the brutal arrest reached the county police.
“It set off major alarms,” recalled Hickey. “Burke was panic-stricken. McPartland was trying to calm him down a bit, saying it would be the prisoner’s word against his. That he was a career criminal, a petty thief. That he wasn’t even showing a lot of injuries, that [the FBI] wouldn’t have enough horsepower to go through with this.”
A December 2013 voicemail from the FBI to Burke announced an end to the probe, which was resurrected in mid-2015 after a detective involved in the beating planned to testify against the powerful trio of officials.
Hickey recalled how his stress level amped up, with the pressure on him to make sure everyone under his command kept their mouths shut.
Hickey said his motivation was simple: “If I went against James Burke, Tom Spota and Christopher McPartland, I would be dead. I’d be finished. I’d be Public Enemy No. 1.”
The trial began earlier this month, with both Spota and his one-time colleague pleading innocent to the charges. Burke pleaded guilty in February 2016 to obstructing justice and violating Loeb’s civil rights, and just finished his prison sentence this past April.