COOK WANTED OFFICERS TO CLEAR HIS NAME, COURT HEARS

A veteran Peel 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 on Nov. 18, 2005 for conspiracy to import cocaine.

"They had me on the same level as Pablo Escobar...," Cook told a
Brampton court today. "... there wasn't one spec 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 Act. 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 under way
since last November.

He maintains he was told to take the dummy drugs home and return them
to morality 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 water craft.

Rowcliffe and fellow prosecutor Ania Weiler say Cook took the drugs,
which they say he thought were real - not fake - 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 would 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...I would never engage in any criminal activity.

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.

"The truth is I was told to take that box home by Williams and it was
done under the direction of Rykhoff...I never thought in my wildest
dreams I would ever be in this position."

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.

He maintains Rykhoff took a box from the back of the courier truck
that night and walked away with it, later asking to borrow the keys
to his cruiser.

Cook has denied putting the box into his cruiser.

He later saw five boxes loaded from a CIB van to a morality van and
never asked Rykhoff if the box he took was in that load.

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 baby sitter.

He caught a few hours of sleep. But RCMP officers, some wearing
bullet proof vests, stopped his car as he left his garage with his
children about 11 a.m.

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

The RCMP also found a small quantity of marijuana in a box in his
garage. He said the box was the property of a tenant, who skipped out
on renting a condo owned by his brother, who was storing the boxes in
his garage.

Police also located 21 MP3 players at the home, which they said were
among more than 400 allegedly stolen from an un-related investigation.

Cook explained the MP3s belonged to his brother, and were bought at a
flea market to give as gifts to his real estate clients.

Rykhoff never showed up for work on Nov. 17. Instead, he went to
Halifax with friends for a college football game, faking illness and
phoning in sick.

Rykhoff was subsequently convicted of Police Act offences and docked
five days pay. He was also suspended until mid-January 2006.

Court has also heard a sliced open package with the dummy drugs was
found by the RCMP in a dumpster near where Rykhoff lived.

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.