'SERPICO' CLAIMS SCOTLAND YARD ELITE RAN DRUG CARTEL

DRUG rackets worth millions of pounds were run from inside Britain's
biggest police force, according to a former Scotland Yard detective who is
to publish his allegations.

The officer, dubbed "Serpico" by friends after the New York police officer
who was pilloried for exposing corruption, described sections of the drug
squad and the regional crime squad at Scotland Yard as the "most
professional criminal cartels in Britain". He is writing a book in which he
alleges that officers stole drugs, paid phantom informants and fabricated
evidence.

Duncan MacLaughlin, a detective for 18 years, is believed to be the first
officer to talk openly about alleged corruption within the elite squads in
which he worked.

His claims are likely to give renewed urgency to the efforts by Sir Paul
Condon, the Metropolitan police commissioner, to stamp out criminal
activity within the force. Condon has already launched a wide-ranging
inquiry into police corruption, and has set up CIB3, a special unit of the
Complaints Investigation Bureau, to investigate.

MacLaughlin, 38, who admits he was not "straighter than straight", spent
five years in the drug squad and five years in the London-based regional
crime squad, which drew the best detectives from forces across southern
England to investigate serious crime.

He described the regional squad, which he left in 1994, as like Colditz,
the second world war prison. "You put all the clever ones, all the brains,
in one office, and you got the cleverest scams. There were no better
criminals in the country . . . I was a member of the most professional
criminal cartel that Britain has ever produced."

MacLaughlin said hundreds of thousands of pounds were siphoned from police
funds through the creation of phantom informants. "If we got anonymous
information that there was going to be a deal involving, say, 25 kilos of
coke [cocaine], straightaway you would create an imaginary informant. Then
a friend would come in and sign a bit of paper and maybe receive up to
UKP40,000 reward money."

Another practice was to sell drugs which were seized on raids. "Drugs were
recycled all the time. If you found 15 kilos of coke, you produce 12 kilos
and 3 would be sold. A kilo of coke you get UKP30,000 for, so you have made
UKP90,000."

The claims are some of the most detailed made against Scotland Yard.
MacLaughlin resigned in July. He was facing a discipline charge - which he
denies - for allegedly removing paperwork relating to a murder investigation.

MacLaughlin does not admit to being involved in any of the crimes he
alleges, though he does admit to holidaying in the Caribbean while on
police assignment to trace a drug baron's assets. He said he did not feel
guilty because he was not spending taxpayers' money, but cash from a Home
Office reward fund. "I was no angel, I would go back to the Caribbean just
when it suited me. The Met police had no idea. It just showed how
incompetent they were," he said.

Roy Clark, deputy assistant commissioner of Scotland Yard, said that some
of MacLaughlin's claims were false and others "wildly exaggerated". He said
it was a pity that MacLaughlin was "not prepared to come forward and, if
there was any truth in his suggestions, share his information with the
anti-corruption squad".

Another former senior officer in the complaints bureau described
MacLaughlin as an oddball who would have been sacked had he not resigned.

MacLaughlin claims that he was rebuffed when he tried to give information
to Ian Quinn, the bureau's director. A Scotland Yard source dismissed the
claim and said MacLaughlin had made an allegation to the bureau about the
private life of a senior officer for which there was "not an iota of
evidence".

Checked-by: Pat Dolan