They had - they were in plain clothes with just police on the back. LAKER: What was so terrible is these cops came in - a lot of these merchants didn't even know they were cops. MARTIN: Which was what? Because some people might say, OK, well, so maybe it's against the law to be selling these little Ziploc baggies because those can be considered drug paraphernalia. And independently, across the board, they all told us the same story. And we tracked down these merchants across the city. So we went back to this room that has all the search warrants, and we went through hundreds upon hundreds of warrants and picked out the ones where this squad raided bodegas - is what we call them in Philadelphia - these corner stores. And we remembered that from going through all these search warrants that we had for the first part of our story, we remembered that a lot of these merchants all across the city - all four corners of the city - had been raided by this same squad where other squads did not raid these corner stores - mom-and-pop stores. And in turn, they came in and they busted the video surveillance cameras, ripped wires out and looted the store. And they raided the store for these little Ziploc baggies that some of the corner stores sell. And he said, you know this squad you're writing about? Well, they came into my store. LAKER: It went way beyond that when, after we started running the first stories about the relationship between Benny and Jeff Cujdik, Wendy got a call from an attorney who represented a merchant in Philadelphia - a Jordanian man. MARTIN: When did you realize it was actually bigger than that? MARTIN: So, Barbara, maybe you want to pick it up there. So basically, Benny, who had a drug habit, was going to places and not doing the buys because he didn't want people to know that he was the informant. But the problem was that they were running out of people to set up. And so they also had a built-in financial incentive, the rent, to make drug buys. You can't have a financial relationship with your police informant. So that went against police department protocols. RUDERMAN: Right - well, they had - basically, they had a financial arrangement. MARTIN: Well, first of all, what did you think was wrong? And then, secondly, what turned out to be even more wrong than that? He was afraid that either the police officer wanted him dead or the drug dealers on the streets wanted him dead because what had happened was he and Jeff Cujdik set up a big-time drug dealer who had enough resources to hire a very high-powered attorney, who - that attorney then hired a private investigator and suspected that Benny had set him up - so basically, had Benny followed around by the private investigator who took pictures of Benny coming out of Jeff's house and establishing that they had this relationship that crossed the line. RUDERMAN: Benny was looking for some protection. So the money that he was making was flowing back to the police officer in the way of rent. You get paid for every door knock you do in which drugs are exchanged. In Philadelphia, being a drug informant is actually a job. And what was happening was he was working with this one officer, Jeff Cujdik, and Jeff Cujdik had some real estate. WENDY RUDERMAN: Benny Martinez had been a drug informant for seven years, which is an incredibly long time. That said, I started by asking Wendy Ruderman about Benny Martinez, the police informant who got the story started. And before we begin, I should mention that this conversation contains details and language that some might find disturbing. I caught up with them when they were in Washington, D.C. Wendy Ruderman and Barbara Laker are the authors. #THEINE PHILADELPHIA SERIES#That book is titled "Busted: A Tale of Corruption and Betrayal in the City of Brotherly Love." Now actress Sarah Jessica Parker is reportedly on board to star in a television series based on the book. The reporting eventually led to a Pulitzer Prize, an FBI probe and a book that tells the story behind the story. They learned about officers routinely making up evidence, robbing innocent storeowners and sexually assaulting women. In 2009, two reporters of the Philadelphia Daily News turned a tip from a frightened police informant into a 10-month series that exposed corruption in the city's police department. Today, we're bringing you an encore of a conversation about a true crime story where it's hard to tell the good guys from the bad guys. I'm Michel Martin and this is TELL ME MORE from NPR News.
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