Retired Pa. Officer Cleared of Charges in Drug Arrest

An Allegheny County jury on Wednesday cleared a retired Pittsburgh police officer of all charges stemming from accusations that he lied on a police affidavit in a drug case and took money from the suspects.

Ken Simon, 50, a 17-year veteran of the force, remained stoic as the jury foreman announced verdicts of not guilty on all 11 charges, including perjury, theft and obstructing the administration of law. The jury of four men and eight women deliberated less than four hours.

The jury apparently did not believe allegations that Simon lied about seeing a drug deal between two men in July 2010 at a North Side car wash and then took more than $800 from one of them as part of a shakedown.

Simon hugged his attorney, Bill Difenderfer, and his family after the jury left the room but declined to comment.

"It's easy to defend a case where the client is truthful about what happened," Difenderfer said. "He charged these guys with narcotics they truly had."

Simon testified in his own defense Tuesday, telling the jury he thought he saw a drug deal between Timothy Joyce, 23, and David Carpenter, 39, and when he and his partner, Officer Anthony Scarpine, searched the men, the officers found heroin on Joyce and cocaine on Carpenter. Prosecutors didn't dispute the men had drugs but played a surveillance video from the car wash for the jury that showed the men never exchanged drugs, as Simon's affidavit claims.

A district judge last year dismissed charges against Scarpine, who remains on the force. Prosecutors withdrew charges against Joyce and Carpenter.

Simon and Scarpine both testified that Scarpine wrote the police report and then cut and pasted that information into an affidavit. Simon said he didn't bother to read it before filing the charges and that it contained errors, but he genuinely thought he saw a drug deal.

Difenderfer said the officers should have been disciplined internally for sloppy police work but not criminally charged, saying it wasn't intentional.

District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr. said the video clearly shows that Joyce and Carpenter were charged with "felonies for actions they didn't commit" but that he respects the jury's verdict.

"The jury spoke as to the guilt or innocence of this individual," Zappala said. "He's saying he made a mistake. We see it otherwise. It's an integrity issue."

Zappala stood behind his decision to review 31 cases that Simon and Scarpine were involved in as the arresting officers. Zappala dropped 14 of those cases where he said the evidence was exclusively based on Simon's credibility, including overturning one jury verdict in which a man was convicted.