"MIT officer arraigned in painkillers case" by Matt Byrne, Globe Correspondent | March 17, 2009
A Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer was arraigned yesterday morning with two other men in East Boston District Court on drug trafficking charges after their arrest Saturday night at a neighborhood auto body shop with a cache of over 800 prescription pain killers, authorities said.
Joseph D'Amelio, 38, the MIT police officer, was arrested along with his cousin, Anthony Cristallo, 39, after a sting by Boston and State Police and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers. Also arrested was Donald Smoot, 52, an employee of Advanced Automotive who allegedly signed for the package that contained the drugs, said Jake Wark, press secretary for the Suffolk district attorney's office. The package was delivered to Advanced Automotive on London Street in East Boston from somewhere in Florida, Wark said.
Inside the package police found 340 OxyContin pills in 80-milligram doses, along with 500 Roxicodone tablets in various dosages. If convicted, D'Amelio, Cristallo, and Smoot could each face 20 years in prison, Wark said. Not guilty pleas were entered on behalf of the three, Wark said.
Each is being held on $500,000 bail. Assistant District Attorney Allison Callahan of the district attorney's narcotics unit told the court that Cristallo, of Derry, N.H., had been imprisoned in New Hampshire for 15 years after his conviction for a murder he committed at age 16, according to the district attorney.
D'Amelio was placed on administrative leave without pay. The university is cooperating with authorities, said Patricia Richards, a spokeswoman for MIT. While Boston police detectives and federal agents stood by on London Street Saturday, a state trooper dressed as a
As police watched and listened, Smoot allegedly called D'Amelio, who arrived in his MIT police uniform in a marked cruiser. D'Amelio allegedly examined the pills and told Smoot, "My guy is going to want them all," Wark said. D'Amelio called Cristallo, who arrived soon after and paid Smoot $16,000 in cash for all the pills, Wark said. The three were arrested soon afterward.
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