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NYPD Cop Pimped Prostitutes on Long Island, Feds Say

An 11-year veteran of the NYPD who was fired last month was charged with pimping more than 10 women at motels in the metropolitan area and on Long Island, federal authorities said.

NYPD officer Eduardo Cornejo, 33, was expected to be arraigned Tuesday afternoon in federal court in Brooklyn on charges of transporting women in interstate commerce to engage in prostitution.

Robert Capers, US Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said Cornejo “betrayed the trust” of city residents by promoting prostitution and profiting from “his exploitation of women.”

“Cornejo not only abused the public trust, given to him as an NYPD officer,” added FBI Assistant Director in Charge Diego Rodriguez, “but he showed no human decency” when he pimped out the women.

Federal authorities began conducting surveillance on Cornejo after an anonymous tipster told the NYPD last year that the cop was allegedly “selling sexual services of a young woman,” according to the criminal complaint, which was unsealed Tuesday.

Investigators followed Cornejo around Staten Island, Long Island, and the Bronx for months, staking out motels and observing conversations between Cornejo and nearly a dozen women believed to be prostitutes, the complaint states.

Their investigation took them to East Meadow on several occasions, where Cornejo was allegedly spotted with multiple women—some of whom authorities linked to escort services.

On Dec. 5, an undercover investigator set up an appointment with one of the women linked to Cornejo and discussed sexual services while the cop was at the unidentified motel in East Meadow.

Eventually, the feds recorded wiretap conversations in which Cornejo allegedly discussed splitting profits with one of the women and concerns about cops getting suspicious if they saw him standing with a group of women outside motel rooms.

“I commend our Internal Affairs Bureau which takes a proactive role in investigating serious misconduct among the ranks of the NYPD and works closely with prosecutors in building cases against those who violate the very laws that they have sworn to enforce,” said NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton.

Cornejo faces up to a decade in prison, if convicted. He was fired on Jan. 15.