SIX OFFICERS TO BE CHARGED IN CORRUPTION INVESTIGATION

Four Others Implicated But Not Indicted; All 10 Were In Now-Disbanded Drug
Squad

Six Toronto police officers are expected to turn themselves in today on a
total of 22 criminal charges that range from conspiracy to obstruct justice
to extortion, perjury, theft over $5,000 and assault.

Four others are to be named as unindicted co-conspirators, The Globe and
Mail has learned.

All 10 are former members of the force's notorious and now-disbanded
central drug squad.

The arrests are the culmination of an investigation that began in a small
way four years ago within the Toronto force itself. The investigation was
turned over by Toronto Police Chief Julian Fantino to the Royal Canadian
Mounted Police about two years ago and morphed into an enormous corruption
probe; the Crown brief is reportedly more than 550,000 pages long.

Chief Fantino told The Globe last night he would "not deny" the pending
charges today, but he would not comment further.

The probe began in the spring of 1999, with allegations of thefts of
relatively small amounts of money from the force's so-called "fink fund,"
used by officers to pay their informants.

That investigation led in the fall of 2000 to dozens of criminal and Police
Act charges, virtually all of them abruptly dropped in February last year,
with the only case that proceeded to court, and involving two officers from
another squad, resulting in jury acquittals.

But RCMP Chief Superintendent John Neily has been leading a parallel but
separate probe, and in today's arrests are its most significant fruits yet.

Among those expected to appear at an east-end police station for processing
are Staff-Sergeant John Schertzer, Detective Constable Steven Correia and
Constables Raymond Pollard, Joseph Miched, Ned Maodus (who this week also
was charged with three drug-related offences) and Richard Benoit.

They are expected to be immediately suspended with pay while awaiting their
trials.

The four who are to be named as unindicted co-conspirators --meaning they
are not charged but nonetheless will be placed on restricted duties -- are
officers Greg Forestall, John Reid, Jason Kondo and Mike Turnbull.

The huge brief has been being reviewed for the past six months by a team of
Crown prosecutors headed by James Stewart. With the probe estimated to have
cost more than $2.8-million, involving up to 25 officers seconded to it and
entering its third year, rumours of charges have been swirling for weeks.