LOOKS LIKE DRUG ARREST IS A BUST

It was a big bust for a Philadelphia Housing Authority narc.

Two international drug traffickers were under arrest, and more than 3.2
pounds of heroin, worth at least $500,000 in street sales, had been seized
from their car without a shot being fired.

Within days, the feds elected to prosecute the pair, part of a Guatemalan
heroin smuggling ring, hoping to send them to prison for a long time.

And the gung-ho cop who made it all happen, Harry Fernandez, soon was
recruited to work for the U.S. Drug Administration's local task force, a
feather in any cop's cap, on an ongoing investigation of the Guatemalan
connection.

Problem was, according to a federal grand jury, Fernandez had made up the
story about why he stopped the car and how the heroin had been found.

And, Fernandez allegedly compounded his wrongdoing by getting five other
PHA cops -- his partner, Rosemary Weston, and Michael Duross, Todd Jordan,
Joseph Watts and Ariel Morales -- to lie to prosecutors and federal agents,
the grand jury said.

The other officers have now fingered Fernandez and they won't be charged
with any criminal wrongdoing, sources said.

In a four-count indictment unsealed yesterday, Fernandez was charged with
conspiring to obstruct justice and making false statements to the U.S.
attorney's office.

Fernandez, 30, of Oakley Street near Princeton, a former star baseball
player in high school, married and the father of three, pleaded not guilty
and was released on a $100,000 bond, secured by his house, to await trial.

In court records, Fernandez claimed he had good reason to stop the pair's
car on Thompson Street near 4th, North Philadelphia, because the heroin was
in plain view.

The drug traffickers' told a far different story to authorities. They
claimed the heroin and the cash were nowhere in sight, hidden in a secret
compartment beneath the steering wheel.

Faced with the tainted bust, prosecutors said they had no choice but to
plea-bargain with the suspects, trading leniency for their testimony
against other drug traffickers and the cop who busted them, Fernandez.

One defendant, Enrique Matos Gotay, 46, was sentenced in October by U.S.
District Judge Stewart Dalzell to 42 months in prison for his part in the
heroin trafficking conspiracy.

The other, Dr. Jose Barrios Lopez, 38, a physician, awaits sentencing for
using a telephone to facilitate drug trafficking, and the most he can get
is 40 months.