Cop Accused Of Tipping Drug Dealers In Grand Jury Probe

Monongahela Police Veteran George Langan Arrested On Drug, Corruption Charges

WASHINGTON, Pa. — An 18-year veteran of the Monongahela Police Department was arrested while on duty Friday morning, following a grand jury investigation of drug and corruption allegations.

 Patrolman George Langan, 45, of Monongahela, declined comment to Team 4 investigator Jim Parsons as he arrived at the Washington County Courthouse, still wearing his uniform.

“The charges allege Langan protected drug dealers — first by alerting them to pending searches and arrests — and that he also revealed critical, highly confidential police information of counter-narcotics efforts in that area,” District Attorney Steven Toprani said

Langan is accused of accepting cash and cocaine for personal use and helping alleged dealers in exchange, said Toprani, who revealed that Langan came under investigation in June “after drug task force detectives from my county office suspected that several heroin and cocaine investigations were compromised by tip-offs that he allegedly made to targets of those investigations.”

Police Chief Brian Tempest — who worked alongside Langan as a patrolman until last year — wasn’t surprised by the arrest.

 ”We had rumors for at least 10 years that George Langan was involved in illegal activity,” said Tempest.

 Langan was arraigned at District Judge Curtis Thompson’s office and taken to Washington County Correctional Facility on $500,000 bond. A hearing was scheduled for Sept. 16.

 WTAE Channel 4′s news exchange partners at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reported that the charges include obstruction of justice, hindering apprehension, official oppression, possession and delivery of suspected cocaine, conspiracy and witness intimidation.

 Law enforcement sources told Team 4 that Langan tried to hide his payoffs by using them to buy real estate in the Bentleyville area.

 The FBI, state police and the state attorney general’s office assisted with the investigation.

3 slain Pittsburgh officers to lie in state

By DAN NEPHIN, Associated Press – Mon Apr 6, 10:48 am ET

PITTSBURGH – The bodies of three slain Pittsburgh police officers will lie in state at a downtown municipal building, city officials announced Monday.

The viewing at the City-County Building will begin Wednesday afternoon for officers Eric Kelly, Stephen Mayhle and Paul Sciullo II. A memorial service will be held Thursday at an arena on the University of Pittsburgh Campus.

Richard Poplawski, 23, was wearing a bulletproof vest when he opened fire on the officers who were responding to a domestic disturbance call Saturday, turning a quiet Pittsburgh street into a battlefield, police said.

The 911 call that brought Sciullo and Mayhle to the home where they were ambushed on Saturday, and where Kelly was later killed during a four-hour siege, was precipitated by a fight between the gunman and his mother over a dog urinating in the house.

Thursday’s memorial will also serve as the funeral service for 41-year-old Officer Eric Kelly, who will be buried immediately afterward.

Separate funeral services are set for Mayhle and Sciullo.

The argument between Margaret and Richard Poplawski escalated to the point that she threatened to kick him out and she called police to do it, according to a 12-page criminal complaint and affidavit filed late Saturday.

When Sciullo and Mayhle arrived, Margaret Poplawski opened the door and told them to come in and take her son, apparently unaware he was standing behind her with a rifle, the affidavit said. Hearing gunshots, she spun around to see her son with the gun and ran to the basement.

The mother told police her son had been stockpiling guns and ammunition “because he believed that as a result of economic collapse, the police were no longer able to protect society,” the affidavit said.

Autopsies show Sciullo, 37, died of wounds to the head and torso. Mayhle, 29, was shot in the head.

A witness awakened by two gunshots told investigators of seeing the gunman standing in the home’s front doorway and firing two to three shots into one officer who was already down. Sciullo was later found dead in the home’s living room, and Mayhle near the front stoop, police said.

Kelly, 41, was killed as he arrived to assist the first two officers. Kelly was in uniform but on his way home when he responded and was gunned down in the street.

Kelly’s radio call for help summoned other officers, including a SWAT team. The ensuing standoff included a gun battle in which police say Richard Poplawski tried to kill other officers.

Poplawski is charged with three counts of criminal homicide and nine counts of attempted homicide — one each for the eight officers who were shot at in an armored SWAT vehicle, plus a ninth who was shot in the hand as he tried to help Kelly.

A district judge arraigned Poplawski at a hospital. It was not immediately clear if Poplawski had an attorney.