Garbage Bail Kid

Ex-Lt. Billy White says he took bribes from bail bondsmen for a few months. The bondsmen say it was five years.
Thursday, November 08, 2007
By Betsy Yagla

Former New Haven Police Lt. Billy White claims he only began taking bribes to do part of his job—hunt down and arrest fugitives—in 2006, when the FBI and an undercover state police investigator began cracking White's web of corruption in the department's narcotics squad.

But the men who were bribing him say it began years earlier. Four years earlier, actually.
The Jacobs bail bonds family—father Robert and his two sons, Philip and Paul—pleaded guilty in federal court last week to paying illegal bribes to White and others (officers not necessarily employed by New Haven) since 2002.

That four-year discrepancy could mean thousands of dollars in restitution to the city. White's been asked to forfeit $10,200 he made from bribes taken during the eight months he was under investigation. Imagine the amount White pocketed during those earlier four years.

White's guilty plea—essentially an agreement between him and the government—stipulates he won't be charged with additional crimes by the FBI. But that doesn't preclude other government entities, like the city, from going after him for those four years. The city was paying White to do narcotics work, but White was spending a chunk of that time—city time—working for the Jacobses and himself instead.

Rob Smuts, the city's chief administrative officer, says the city can't look into those four years until the U.S. attorney's office gives them the nod. "After the U.S. attorney's office is done with their investigation, we'll certainly look into it," says Smuts.

Mayor John DeStefano's withholding judgment too. "We don't preclude any possibilities," says Jessica Mayorga, reading from a statement by DeStefano. "This case has just been adjudicated and his sentencing, including restitution and fines, has not yet been set."