COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — A narcotics officer with the police force in Ohio’s capital city pleaded guilty Tuesday to charges of distributing fentanyl and accepting bribes to protect cocaine shipments, federal prosecutors announced.
Marco Merino, 45, was arrested by the FBI in September and accused of distributing approximately 7 1/2 kilograms of fentanyl, a powerful painkiller implicated in overdose deaths in Ohio and elsewhere.
Merino pleaded guilty to drug distribution and to a charge that he accepted $45,000 to protect the safe transport of at least 47 kilograms of cocaine. Those shipments were set up by the FBI and didn’t involve actual cocaine, prosecutors said.
Merino also tried to recruit a confidential informant to traffic drugs with him, according to court documents, and promised that person law enforcement protection. The government said Merino also intended to gain citizenship in Mexico as part of a plan to launder drug proceeds.
Merino resigned from the Columbus police department in October. His attorney declined comment Tuesday. Merino faces up to 20 years in prison; no sentencing date has been set.
Charges are still pending against a second officer arrested with Merino last fall on a drug distribution charge.
