Undercover deputy targeted mentally disabled teen, parents say
It was the start of his first year at Chaparral High School in Temecula (CA) and he’d found a new friend — his only friend — Daniel Briggs.
They had art class together.
Doug and Catherine Snodgrass said they were happy when their son, then 17, told them about Daniel. They said their son’s autism makes social interaction difficult for him and he has had few friends in his life.
“We told him, ‘Why don’t you have him come over?’” Doug Snodgrass said.
But Daniel kept putting their son off.
“He would always have some bizarre excuse,” Catherine Snodgrass said.
Later, they found out why. “Daniel Briggs” was actually Deputy Daniel Zipperstein of the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department, they said. He posed as a student for several months in an effort to ferret out drug dealing on campus.
...
The Snodgrasses said the deputy began pressuring their son for drugs almost immediately after they met, sending him dozens of text messages.
The deputy told their son he was “desperate,” they said, and asked not only for marijuana but his prescription clonazepam.
The teen didn’t have access to prescription drugs — his parents control his medication. But eventually, they said, their son obtained small amounts of marijuana and twice sold it to the deputy for $20 near campus. He later told his parents he had bought the marijuana from a homeless man on the street.
http://www.pe.com/local-news/riverside-county/temecula/temecula-headlines-index/20130202-temecula-undercover-deputy-targeted-mentally-disabled-teen-parents-say.ece
= new reply since forum marked as read
