Time for an investigation into Sadek’s death

60 Minutes piece reiterates need for answers

This past weekend, 60 Minutes delved into the murky world of confidential informants, highlighted by the death of one of our own Andrew Sadek, the NDSCS student from Wahpeton who was more than likely murdered because of his work as a confidential informant. Sadek was pressured to become an informant after selling $80 worth of weed on campus and threatened with 40 years in jail and $40,000 in fines. His mother recently told HPR she will seek to end the practice of law enforcement recruiting college students as informants with a bill in the next session of the North Dakota Legislature. But she is resigned to not getting answers in her son’s death.

She deserves more and after the nation attention this case has gotten, we should demand more. Tennessee Congressman Steve Cohen saw the 60 Minutes piece and asked for a Justice Department investigation as a result into the practice of using college students as informants. He is right but more specifically, there needs to be a Justice Department investigation into Andrew Sadek’s death and whether or not his work as an informant contributed to his death and if police are dragging their feet on investigating his death because of his work as C.I. More than a year after his death, we still don’t have answers as to why he died. We know how, a gunshot to the head following a fall from a bridge where his backpack was weighted with rocks. Police have suggested to his mother that it may have been suicide. If it was, it would be a strange way to kill yourself with no suicide note, rocks in the backpack, just ahead of graduating college. Sadek’s parents deserve answers and so do you as a North Dakotan. It is just not right and law enforcement wants to brush it under the rug and make you forget about it but they can’t. Time and time again, the case keeps resurfacing because of the awful nature of it.

The narcotics officer who recruited Sadek, Jason Weber, suggested to another informant that an attorney wouldn’t help him it was revealed in the 60 Minutes reporting. Weber denies that allegation however Andrew didn’t inform his parents or an attorney following his arrest and subsequent threat of penalties if he didn’t inform for them. Had he told his parents or an attorney, he may still be alive. But who can blame a 20 year kid for not knowing what’s best. All of this is all the more reason we shouldn’t put them in that position.

And what is it for? 2 bags worth of weed valued at $80. Do we really need a task force forcing college students into dangerous positions over pot? We could probably understand if they were working on cases involving meth or heroin, but weed? The move nationally is to legalize marijuana. It is not a dangerous drug and we would gather a large percentage of college students use it. It is just not worth it to have law enforcement threatening college students with decades in jail over a couple bags of weed.

Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem, a candidate for Governor in North Dakota in 2016, said he opposes efforts to remove a class of citizens such as college students as college informants. He said no coercion was found in Sadek’s case. If threatening a college student with 40 years in jail over selling two bags of weed isn’t coercion, we don’t know what is. He mentioned that South Dakota law enforcement agents investigated the practices of SEMCA (The Southeast Multi-County Agency Drug Task Force) and it was found to have done no wrong in the Sadek case and in its practices. They made some changes however as a result of the investigation including putting a ND Bureau of Criminal Investigation agent in charge of the task force. Having agents from a neighboring state investigate their practices however is not enough. Specifically what’s needed is a federal investigation into Andrew Sadek’s death and his work as a criminal informant. If it can’t drum up some answers or wrong doing, maybe we will never learn the truth. But it’s worth a try and hopefully Congressman and Senators from North Dakota and Minnesota will demand these answers and investigation as well not just a lone Congressman from Tennessee. Tammy Sadek deserves it.