The Disposable Life of a 20-Year-Old Confidential Informant
Andrew Sadek was bullied into becoming an informant by an unaccountable drug task force. When he turned up dead, police washed their hands of him.
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GoogleOn June 27, 2014, the body of 20-year-old Andrew Sadek, a promising electrical student at the North Dakota State College of Science (NDSCS) in Wahpeton, North Dakota, was pulled from the Red River bordering North Dakota and Minnesota.
Missing for two months, the young man was found shot in the head, wearing a backpack filled with rocks.
The grisly death of a college student in one of the safest towns in the state, where violent crime is extremely rare, did not lead to a sweeping investigation. In fact, police immediately said they did not suspect foul play.
Such a supposition strains credulity as it is, but what would be slowly revealed over the following months is that Andrew had been working as a confidential informant for the police, and that his school knew that authorities were busting its students and using them as bait to catch drug dealers.
This is a story of overzealous prosecution of minor drug offenses by a task force answerable only to itself, callous official indifference toward a grieving family, and a lack of transparency by authorities that raises more questions than it answers.
Paramount among these questions: Why are police using non-violent, first-time offenders in the very dangerous role of confidential informant?
A QUIET FARM KID
Growing up on a family-owned farm in Rogers, North Dakota, Andrew Sadek was active with the raising of their cattle and particularly close to his parents, who lost their older son, Nick, in a car accident in 2005.
Andrew was a few weeks shy of graduation when he went missing in May 2014. Days later, the Sadeks received the shocking news that a warrant had been issued for Andrew's arrest for two felony counts of distributing a controlled substance.
In an interview with Reason TV, Andrew's mother, Tammy, described her deceased younger son as "kind of a homebody" whose only previous brush with the law was a speeding ticket.
"His dreams were to become an electrician and take over the family farm," Tammy says of Andrew. "We sent him off to college, he was excelling at college. That's why this was such a shock to us."
For two gut-wrenching months, the Sadeks prayed Andrew would come home to the farm to help with the spring calving, while police continued to assume Andrew was on the lam.
Then, Andrew's body was found.
Shot. Wearing the backpack filled with rocks. Not wearing the clothes he was last seen in. Without his wallet. An autopsy proved inconclusive in determining suicide or homicide, and no weapon has yet been found.
But according to the Sadeks, Sgt. Steve Helgeson of the NDSCS Campus Police, the lead officer in charge of the investigation, tried to convince them that their son put on the rock-filled backpack, shot himself in the head, and somehow propelled himself into the river.
Tammy says Sgt. Helgeson told her "That's what kids do in that area, they commit suicide," referring to the golf court bridge over the river that connects the Bois de Sioux golf course.
No one who knew Andrew supports this theory. His friend Justin Rippentrop told Reason TV that Andrew was a "laid-back, generous, fun-loving guy," who never showed depressive tendencies and seemed in particularly good spirits as his graduation date approached. Crucially, no one at the college has indicated that Andrew was exhibiting any signs of emotional distress, and no suicide note has been found.
A DRUG TASK FORCE LACKING TRANSPARENCY AND ACCOUNTABILITY
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Informants are just little people. Who cares what happens to them? There's always more, amirite?
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Hey, he could have done life in prison for selling two nickel bags of ditchweed to another CI and having some shake in his dorm room. They were merciful!
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Interesting that the cops use techniques they learned from the mob. Hey, if you can't beat'em, join'em, eh? Speaking of which, how far is Wahpeton from Fargo?
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The mob? This is the USSR all the way.
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"It's for the children."
"If it saves one life..."
"To Protect and Serve"[hurl]
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"Deckard if you ain't cop, you're little people."
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"You know, Agent Sadusky, something I've noticed about fishing? It never works out so well for the bait.
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See also: Rachel Hoffman of Tallahassee FL.
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Fisher includes a section on her in the article.
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It takes a willful kind of stupid to send a young girl into a coke and gun deal alone with a bundle of cash.
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That is ALL kinds of fucked up. Lord....
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Yeah, but better her than them, right? I mean they all went home safe that night and that's what counts, right? RIGHT!?
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Well that wasn't a terrible story.
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The Tallahassee Police Department admitted that Hoffman had no training to work undercover, she did not know the two men targeted in the sting, and she had no experience with cocaine or firearms and very little with MDMA. The officers involved in the operation were suspended with pay,...
Yeah.. they sure threw the book at those fuck-ups.. They'll think twice before they pull a another stunt like that again. Behold the awful price of malicious incompetence.. and learn from it.
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Poor kid must have been part Russian to commit such a complex suicide. I don't know how these families restrain themselves when some ass with a badge basically says, "fuck your loser kid."
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I don't know how any juror could find them guilty if they didn't restrain themselves.
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Well, at least they didn't threaten to throw him in a woodchipper or something actually horrible like that. I mean - a nice head shot - boom. Game over.
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You know who else treated citizens like commodities once they were no longer useful to the state....
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Every Democrat since Wilson?
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Every
Democratpolitician since Wilson?FTFY
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Every
Democratpolitician sinceWilsonthe discovery of fire?FTFY
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Every
Democratpoliticiansince Wilson the discovery of fire?FTFY
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You're going to have to narrow that down a bit.
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[REDACTED]
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Robespierre?
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Jim Henson?
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Statism and I mean all statism, is fucking evil.
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Andrew was a few weeks shy of graduation when he went missing in May 2014. Days later, the Sadeks received the shocking news that a warrant had been issued for Andrew's arrest for two felony counts of distributing a controlled substance.
So, this kid who they had arrest warrants against becomes an informant before he is (apparently) murdered? I wonder what persuaded him to turn informant?
Sgt. Steve Helgeson, I wish you had a conscience. But then you wouldn't be a cop, would youÉ
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It's more likely that he "went missing" (got killed and didn't report back) so they thought, "He's running from us. Well, we'll fix his little red wagon." Then they issued the warrants.
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So in your world people shouldn't be punished for reneging are their end of the agreement. Libertarianism ladies and gentlemen. No consequences no standards.
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Agreement? I'm pretty sure libertarians believe agreements should be voluntary instead of coerced.
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You are one sick fuck, Sam, perhaps a pegging by Hillary with a big cock would set you straight...nah.
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I couldn't even finish reading this article it makes me so mad.
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All this evil tragedy for...
Weed.
Fucken, bloody, fucken weed.
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And I'm sure the cops went out and drank to celebrate a successful mission after it was all over.
(Disclaimer: Yeah, comparing pot and alcohol as a way to argue for pot legalization is dumb. But here, it fits.)
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comparing pot and alcohol as a way to argue for pot legalization is dumb
Why?
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Because when you "treat pot just like alcohol!!!!!!!" you get insane per se DUI standards...just like alcohol.
The idea that alcohol is not regulated out the ass is insane.
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Yeah, but thins doesn't happen to people who violate alcohol regulations very much.
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Yeah, moonshining is tolerated.
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I read these stories and want to buy a woodchipper.
I remember 1981, when four 16-18 yr olds- all "tripping balls" on Mr Natural and smoking dope- and 3 of whom had been drinking Mickey's Big Mouth (I was the non-drinker in the party) got pulled over by a "rent-a-cop" while driving a '65 Ford Falcon in a "private housing development".
Luckily, the beer was gone by then- but the pot smoke was rather noticeable... The cop asked to search the trunk- he found two cases of empty beer bottles in the trunk of a 17 yr old driver's car.
The cop was disgusted, but resigned... if we turned over our pot, he wouldn't arrest us (my oz. was in my crotch by then). Dan wasn't a cigarette guy, so his ashtray was filled to the brim with nothing but "roaches".
I have never laughed harder in my life than when the cop held out one hand- and more than half the "roaches' landed on the ground- there were literally 200-300 in it!.
Then we drove away- and nothing else happened... WTF happened to my country?
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Andy and Barney retired, and Opie turned out to be an authoritarian prick, a ruthless sociopath, and a chickenshit coward.. with a badge and gun..
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Exactly. We used to throw keg parties outside Minot, ND in the 70's, in a coulee south of town we called Puppydog. The big question was did we want to hear Aerosmith or Warren Zevon.
Other folks partied there as well and left trash around, when we had our keggers we said when we (the partiers) pick up all the trash that other people left we'll tap the keg. Worked pretty well, not much litter after we "policed the area" as my old man put it when camping.
So one day my buddy shows up around supper time with some acid, so we had a party. Come 2 am my the cops show up, my younger brother tipped over and passed out by the bonfire (we called him Oxy, as in the old bleach, he couldn't hold his beer at 18).
So after my friend and I made our case that we actually made an effort to clean the place up the cops seized the keg and left. (It was pretty empty at that point and left). My sister in law (now, 40 years later) was out 50 bucks for the keg and tap deposit, Her mom had dough, so it wasn't a big deal. And no one was arrested or got shot by a cop. We all went home.
No one got shot or pressured to rat someone out, so yep, nothing else happened
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One day, please God, I will live to see a police spokesperson defending the indefensible say "All proceedures were followed properly" and get asked by a reporter "Then, may I assume that the idiot who wrote the proseedures is being charged with manslaughter?"
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I'd settle for a picture of the corpse on the front page the next day with the headline: "Police: Procedures Were Followed"
They could run the same headline every Friday and just change the picture.
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That sounds like a nice web site.
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I thought North Dakota police officials were kind-but-firm motherly figures with a zeal for bringing killers to justice.
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Funny enough I used to partake with Bill Macy a very long time ago. Mamet too.
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They've been replaced with hybrid of Jerry Lundegaard and a pot-bellied pig, and when they catch a kid retailing weed, they say, "Darn tootin' you're facing 40 years. I'm working to help you. Jeez, work with me, kid."
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"The sheep dog is not loved by the flock, and they're hated by the wolf, but we do it anyway." In Thorsteinson's view, the citizens he serves are sheep, while harmless pot dealers like Sadek are wolves.
You want the perfect fucking explanation as to why police think they're above the law? They think the rest of us are sheep.
I'd compare it to the end of Pulp Fiction, but at least Jules was trying to be the shepherd.
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" They think the rest of us are sheep."
We are. Sometimes for wool, sometimes for mutton.
But either way, we're human livestock, and those with the government guns are the ranchers.
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Is officer Choad, aware that the "sheep" pay his bloated salary?
I hope he gets diabetes, and his feet fall off. (Dear DOJ, do I have magic powers? Do you believe I'm a witch?)
Are you that stupid?
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What in the Hell are you talking about/ And what is with the "Woodchipper" moniker? This wouldn't be some kind of secret mockery going on would it?
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We don't talk about woodchippers!
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The first rule of woodchipper club..
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whoa whoa whoa
the above comments are starting to drift beyond mere hyperbolic bluster as interpreted by a certain mutton-headed AUSA who couldn't tell his ass from settled case law.
someone post a disclaimer STAT!
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What and get my name added to the [REDACTED]?
Not that it matters; if you don't think the government has everyone here's info anyway, then you haven't been paying attention. This just gives them a way to introduce it at any possible [REDACTED]. -
Modern law enforcement agencies are the ghostly fingers of Joseph de Maistre pillaging among the groaning beams and hushed halls of a civilization that can never truly free itself from the claws of organized morality, politicized progress, and philosophy poltergeists.
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Where are those "good apples" I keep hearing about?
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I saw a movie whut had one
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My cousin is one of those good apples. He's been a State Trooper for ten years and has reported every instance of corruption and abuse-of-power that he has witnessed. Of course, it should be of no surprise what happens next: he refused to corroborate a superior officer's false report and was immediately relocated to a shithole of a city, 150 miles away from his home and family, so he essentially has no choice but to resign.
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"Why are police using non-violent, first-time offenders in the very dangerous role of confidential informant? "
BFYTW.
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Speculative reasons on why the didn't investigate his murder:
1) They didn't want any bad publicity for their program, and any successful investigation would have revealed that he'd been an informant. Once it had been revealed anyway, starting an investigation then would have clearly shown that was the reason they hadn't done it before then.
2) An investigation would have revealed that they'd ordered him to do something really stupid, perhaps stupid enough that they'd be criminally liable.
3) They know who did it, but arresting the culprit would reveal one or more of their informants, and they'd prefer to keep using those informants to make lots of drug arrests over making a single murder arrest.
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How about the more obvious:
0.) They didn't investigate because they know exactly what happened, exactly who did it and have no interest in exposing their own.
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Matt is likely correct. His #3 scenario happens all the time. Had a couple of identical cases here.
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"3) They know who did it, but arresting the culprit would reveal one or more of their informants, and they'd prefer to keep using those informants to make lots of drug arrests over making a single murder arrest."
With no statute of limitation on the crime of murder, they could afford to catch up with the suspect .. at their leisure.
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We have to keep fighting the Drug War to stop young people from destroying their lives. You see, if it weren't for the War on Drugs, this guy would be alive doing and selling drugs, instead of dead with a bullet to the head. Don't you see how that's a much better outcome for him? [/sarcasm]
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Does North Dakota have civil forfeiture for drug cases? If so, then we may have a clue to the differing priorities regarding dope-dealing versus murder.
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Why, why, that's libel!
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Shut up, tulpa..
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William F Buckley Jr. was 100% correct, "...marijuana prohibition has done far more harm to far more people than marijuana ever could.”
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The WoD probably does more harm in a single day than marijuana has in its five-thousand years of recorded use.
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Should be mandatory viewing for any kid heading off to college
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S̶h̶e̶e̶p̶ Honor-less dogs with guns, badges, and a penchant for sniffing their own assholes.
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That's our war on drugs for you. It is just another excuse to let police and prosecutors do what ever they want. And both main political parties want to keep it that way.
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Democracy got us here.
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DemocracyMob rule has always worked out to the benefit of all mankind.. as it truly represents the will of people. Stupid founders made us a constitutional republic out of spite.. -
But the grinder, plus the two sales to SEMCA's informant in a "school zone," which in North Dakota includes colleges, was enough for authorities to threaten Andrew with two Class A felony charges, each carrying a possible 20 year sentence. Or, he could "voluntarily" agree to work as a confidential informant.
Its particularly astounding to me (living in Colorado and in the MJ business) that this crap continues throughout America. Never has it become clearer to me that the war on drugs is misguided and downright dangerous to those living in the land of the free...Americans.
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Seems likely the police are the ones that put the bullet in his head.
Why would drug dealers go to the trouble of trying to make it look like a suicide?
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Who is worse I sometimes wonder. Criminals adorned with the cloth of law enforcement or just plain unadorned criminals. Personally, I submit it is the former.
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Since most of the latter are criminals only because their actions are defined as crimes rather than being viewed as free exchange between two willing participants, I think it is obvious that you are correct.
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Why are campus police in charge of a potential murder case? They are not even real police officers...
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I gotta say: This is one of the very best Reason TV clips ever.
And the story it tells is a scathing indictment of the War on Drugs. The WoD has so corrupted the idea of justice and law enforcement that officers of the law are more interested busting small-scale retailers of a fairly benign plant than in maintaining a peaceful society.
And when things go wrong, these pigs are far more interested in covering their sorry asses than in investigating a murder and bringing a murderer to justice.
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Thanks, reason. I really needed to have my ball sack used for a speed bag this morning. Jesus fucking Christ...
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The lead suspect ... any pig on the task force.
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Google pay 97$ per hour my last pay check was $8500 working 1o hours a week online. My younger brother friend has been averaging 12k for months now and he works about 22 hours a week. I cant believe how easy it was once I tried it out.
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Cop tries to shoot dog. Hits 4 year old girl instead.
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Didn't you read the headline? The girl wasn't shot by a cop, she was hit by gunfire.
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My bad. That's why guns should be outlawed. They keep randomly shooting people.
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Soo.. the dog shot that poor girl?
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There is a real need to put a firm boot on the neck of American policing NOW!
And that does NOT mean getting the feds involved. Hell, that will only make things a hundred times worse.
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Elected state level office of special prosecutor?
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This is why there are no good cops. They all perpetuate the War on Drugs.
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LAPD shoot man seeking assistance in the head. This one will make you scream.
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I guess the lesson is to NEVER ask the police for help unless it is to be put out of your misery, which they tend to do quite efficiently as in this case.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=01v0ItTqp_I
Good round up of people engaging in guilt by association in an attempt to blame the entire right for the shooting in Charleston.
My personal favorite is Cenk Uygur of the Young Turks getting all high and mighty about evil conservatives. For anyone who doesn't know, Uygur is an Armenian Genocide denier who named his news program after the Young Turks who actually carried out the genocide.
This would be like me naming my news show The Nazi News Hour and when criticized arguing it wasn't a big deal since the Holocaust is a myth concocted by shiftless Jews anyway. I don't think he has the moral authority, therefore, to freak out about southerners flying the Confederate Flag given that none of those people would ever apologize for slave owners the way Uygur apologized for a Turkish committed genocide.
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It shocks me that someone who explicitly waves around the fact that he doesn't think the genocide happened, by naming his fucking Youtube show after the perpetrators, isn't written out of the Leftist movement.
You got some shit to answer for, lefties.
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Upon enrolling at NDSCS, Andrew signed a Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) waiver obligating the school to inform his parents of any disciplinary issues
This doesn't sound right. Mandatory calling parents of adult students for discipline problems? And signing a waiver of your FERPA rights is mandatory for enrollment?
Sgt. Steve Helgeson of the NDSCS Campus Police, the lead officer in charge of the investigation
WTF qualifications does a campus police department of a community college have in investigating a murder? Oh, sorry. "Investigating" a murder. Perfectly qualified for that.
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Holy shit. Is that report a turd or what?
On November 22, 2013, Andrew Sadek came voluntarily to the Law Enforcement Center in Wahpeton, ND. The review board did not find any cause for concern with the recorded interview. The charges Sadek was possibly facing were explained to him. The recorded interview was calm in nature and Sadek understood the situation. After the recorded interview, Sadek went through the paperwork to work as a Confidential Informant (CI), which was completed correctly. The review board did not see anything that caused concern with the Confidential Informant process.
And his attorney was....? That's right, even though Sadek was facing felony charges with up to forty years in prison, somehow he didn't have one & wasn't assigned a PD and just completely on his own, without any coercion, became a CI. This report must have been written by Maxwell Smart.
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The reasons a CI loses contact varies, but some of the most common reasons are the CI committed new crimes, is incarcerated, or involved with drug usage again, etc.
Wait, what? The CI goes to jail and his handler loses contact with him? Doesn't even run him through their computer lookup if they just stopping calling back? B.S.
Deputy Weber informed the review board that to fulfill his obligation in resolving the charges he had been facing, Sadek needed to conduct one (1) more controlled buy from the individual from the January 2014 buy and also needed to purchase from a new suspect.
So Sadek set up two people to be arrested & needed to come up with a third one. I'm going to go out on a limb and say, since they didn't come up with anything other that a grinder in his possession, Sadek sold small amounts to his buddies. Busting two friends that weren't CIs (who got him arrested to begin with) probably depleted his user friends. He would then had to come up with a stranger. And then there's probably another dealer who's turf he was encroaching on by putting out feelers to strangers. Way too many people for Chief Wiggum to investigate.
Maybe professional drug counselor rollo will come along to tell us how Sadek's death was so much better than going on with life and he got what he deserved.
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But wait, there's more! The money shot from the report:
4. Assign a BCI agent to the Wahpeton area and to SEMCA. This would aid in having a direct contact with BCI when dealing with buy funds, reports, CI paperwork, data entry, etc., that is needed when having an operational task force. This would also assist when there are jurisdictional issues around the state.
That's right. Cut the BCI in on the SEMCA action!
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Why are police using non-violent, first-time offenders in the very dangerous role of confidential informant?
Because they're the easiest to intimidate. Next question.
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I'm just waiting for a reboot of The Punisher where Frank Castle's family dies due to a botched no-knock raid. None of the other Marvel heroes stop him because they're too disgusted.
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"Why Are Police Using Non-Violent, First-Time Offenders as Confidential Informants?"
BFYTW.
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Cops are stupid, nothing new there.
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"Upon enrolling at NDSCS, Andrew signed a Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) waiver obligating the school to inform his parents of any disciplinary issues, but the school never notified the Sadeks following the raid on his dorm room, or any time thereafter."
Since FERPA primarily lists privacy rights and their exceptions, it's more likely that the waiver *permitted* them to inform his parents of any disciplinary issues. What is the evidence that is went beyond that, in more detail?
