ACCUSED OFFICER WANTED HELP FROM COLLEAGUES

A veteran Peel Regional Police officer, accused of stealing fake
cocaine from a botched RCMP drug sting, wanted the two officers who
knew the truth to come forward to clear his name.

Cst. Sheldon Cook said the media labelled him a drug trafficker after
his arrest Nov. 18, 2005 for conspiracy to import cocaine.

"They had me on the same level as Pablo Escobar...," Cook told
Brampton court today. "... there wasn't one speck of cocaine found at
my house."

Cook today told federal prosecutor David Rowcliffe that he hired a
private investigator because neither Det. Marty Rykhoff nor Acting
Det. Warren Williams would tell authorities about the box of dummy
cocaine in his police cruiser in the early hours of Nov. 17, 2005.

"These were the only two people who had knowledge of the box," Cook
said during his fifth and final day testifying in his own defence.
"The heart of the matter is that I went out and hired a private
investigator. I knew what the truth was. I wasn't afraid of what he
would uncover."

Cook, 40, has pleaded not guilty to seven criminal charges in this
judge-alone trial before Justice Casey Hill that has been underway
since last November.

He maintains he was told to take the dummy drugs home and return them
to the morality unit the following day. But before that could happen
a GPS unit hidden inside the packages led the RCMP to his Cambridge
home where 15 bricks (packages) were found in his garage inside a
compartment of a watercraft.

Rowcliffe and fellow prosecutor Ania Weiler say Cook took the drugs,
which they say he thought were real, during his involvement as part
of Rykhoff's crew investigating the seizure of 102 bricks of
suspected cocaine from a courier truck.

The white powder turned out to be flour, part of a mistake-filled
RCMP-controlled delivery from Peru to Canada that went missing 12
hours earlier after arriving at Pearson International Airport.

Rowcliffe suggested Cook took advantage of the RCMP's blundering and
saw an opportunity to "score" what he thought was real cocaine and
didn't have time to "dump it" before it was discovered.

Cook said the accusations were outrageous. He'd never have risked "on
the drop of a dime everything" he stands for - his career, his wife,
his two kids, his house - to become a drug trafficker.

He waited four years to tell his story.

"The allegations against me are completely unfounded."

Rykhoff has denied putting the packages in Cook's cruiser or having
any knowledge that Cook took them home. He denied telling Cook to
take them to his home when he testified as a Crown witness in
February. Williams also denied ever seeing the fake bricks in Cook's cruiser.

The 14-year veteran officer discovered the bricks in his cruiser's
trunk at the end of his shift in the early hours of Nov. 17.

Cook today said Williams also told him after his arrest that he spoke
to the RCMP and confirmed he saw the box. But he discovered later
that Williams lied to him about what he told investigators.

"My phone wasn't ringing. My wife was still crying. I just wanted him
to come forward and talk," Cook said. He realized their fear of
prosecution, both criminally and under the Police Act, meant they
weren't going to clear him.

"My life was being turned upside down," Cook said. "I knew only he
and Rykhoff could confirm the box.

"If he (Williams) had come forward and told the truth that he saw the
box in the trunk of my cruiser and had given me direction to hang
onto that box after talking to Marty, then I wouldn't be sitting in
this chair right now."

Cook never thought there would be any consequences for taking the box home.

"I was operating under the authority of my two immediate bosses," he
said. "I believed it wasn't a controlled substance. I believed the
box mistakenly was put in the trunk. I had no reason to believe there
was anything untoward happening."

Cook, Rykhoff and Williams were among several officers who unloaded
boxes of rotting mangoes with hidden suspected bricks of cocaine from
the delivery truck in Mississauga the night before.

Cook never got the chance to return the product as planned because
his shift extended because of a fire call and when he got home he had
to take his children to a babysitter.

He caught a few hours of sleep. But RCMP officers stopped his car as
he left his garage with his children about 11 a.m.

The dummy drugs ended up in his watercraft after the box broke when
he was transferring it from cars in his garage, Cook testified.

Cook is charged with attempt to possess a controlled substance for
the purpose of trafficking, possession of marijuana for the purpose
of trafficking, possession of stolen property (MP3 players) from a
police investigation and breach of trust as a police officer. He
remains suspended with pay.