Two former Baltimore plainclothes police officers who would catch drug dealers, take their heroin, let them go and then sell the stash on through informants have both been sentenced to prison for over 100 years each.

William King and Antonio Murray, who worked for the Baltimore police department’s housing authority unit and committed the robberies from August 2004 until May 2005, received 315 and 139 years, respectively. They were convicted in April.

Because the two men had guns on them when they offloaded the drugs from dealers, under mandatory sentencing guidelines they had to be given 25 years in prison for every count, with the exception of the first for which they received five years. The sentencing judge U.S. District Judge J. Frederick Motz called their punishment grossly disproportionate and the two men plan to appeal.

While Motz had some sympathy for the effective life sentences given to them he wasn’t having any of their rationalisations for what they did. Here are some of them as reported by the press:

* Murray “portrayed the shakedowns as the way things were done on the streets in a difficult and dangerous job” and also claimed his drug busting techniques were taught to him by others in the department and trainers from New York City.

* Murray’s defense attorney said his client “was simply building street credibility and a rapport with informants that would lead to better busts and more arrests.” Murray himself said “no one ever told him his techniques crossed a line” while his mother claimed her son was a “victim of police politics” and was just doing what everyone else did.

* King claimed he had been under pressure from the mayor down to get as many arrests as possible while “Michael Jenson, King’s cousin and a Baltimore firefighter, described King as a good person who “felt he was doing the right thing” and was snagged by departmental politics.”

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