Schenectady cop traded drugs for sex

WNYT
Aug. 19, 2007

SCHENECTADY - NewsChannel 13 has learned that a former Schenectady cop was paying a woman for sexual favors with crack cocaine.

A source says Heather Martin prostituted herself and was being paid in drugs by former Schenectady Police Officer Jeff Curtis.

Curtis stole the crack cocaine from a drug evidence locker in the police station.

Schenectady County District Attorney Robert Carney said on the day Curtis pleaded guilty to stealing the drugs that the former cop also made a profit on them. Now a source close to the investigation says that didn't just mean money, it also meant sex.

Thirty-six-year-old Heather Martin pleaded guilty Thursday to possessing crack cocaine and was taken straight to a rehab facility.

A source close to the investigation says Curtis gave her the drugs in return for sex.

Curtis stole 85 pieces of crack cocaine from a drug evidence locker in the Schenectady Police Station. The missing evidence botched the case against one accused drug dealer, Anthony Best, and the case had to be thrown out.

Best and Martin were both represented by attorney Stephen Rockmacher.

"This has sort of come full circle. Back some time ago, my client, Anthony Best, was here in court when it was discovered evidence was missing. And then between Anthony Best, Detective Curtis and Heather Martin, like I said, the case has come full circle," Rockmacher said.

NewsChannel 13 has also been told Martin blew the whistle on what Curtis did. The source says she was caught with drugs by police in March. Once arrested, she told officers that she was given the drugs by a Schenectady cop in exchange for sex.

By telling all, Martin spared herself some jail time.

"She'll do a residential type program, then go to a half way house, then eventually be on her own," Rockmacher said.

Martin faced up to nine years in jail, but because she pleaded guilty she now faces only time in rehab.