Officer Ryan Warme to Remain in Custody

A federal judge this afternoon ordered Niagara Falls police officer Ryan G. Warme remain in custody because there is reason to believe he poses a danger to the community and witnesses in the case.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Hugh B. Scott issued the ruling at about 1:15 p.m., saying the serious charges against Warme, coupled with no other adequate confinement options that would reduce the risk to the public and witnesses, warranted he stay in custody of the U.S. Marshals Service.

Warme was arrested Dec. 2 for alleged drug, gun and civil rights crimes.

His attorney, Joel L. Daniels, had argued during the detention hearing that Warme, 27, should be allowed to be released and confined to the Grand Island home of his father, Gordon, a retired Niagara Falls police captain.

Prosecutors have alleged Warme, who is awaiting trial, had threatened three witnesses prior to his arrest, including two witnesses who faced death threats.

Earlier, Daniels filed court papers conceding Warme did have sex with two women while on duty but Warme insists that the sex with both women was consensual.

Daniels contends that Warme has been wrongly accused of federal civil rights crimes against the women, identified only as Victim 1 and Victim 2.

Daniels filed 10 pages of court papers in Warme’s defense. The documents were filed in anticipation of a detention hearing scheduled for today in federal court.

“If accurate about the names of Victim 1 and Victim 2, [Warme] asserts the evidence will show not only an absence of violence in defendant’s conduct with these two alleged victims, but that no crime happened at all,” Daniels said.

“Simply put, [Warme] recalls having consensual sex with both ladies.”

Those admissions caught the interest of attorneys for the City of Niagara Falls, who are building an administrative case that they hope will lead to Warme’s termination and removal from the city payroll.

“Obviously, that is gross misconduct, whether consensual or not,” said Deputy Niagara Falls Corporation Counsel Christopher M. Mazur.

Federal prosecutors contend that Warme trafficked in cocaine — sometimes while on duty and in uniform — and that he used his gun and police powers to force two women to have sex with him.

The suspended officer has denied the allegations, pleading not guilty. He could face a lengthy prison term if convicted, particularly if found guilty of carrying his police handgun during civil rights crimes.

Daniels had also asked the judge to give him the names of alleged victims and witnesses in the case, so he can prepare a defense.

Warme believes he knows the identities of the women who have made allegations against him, Daniels said, but those names need to be provided so he can defend his client.

In his court papers, Daniels made the following allegations:

• Warme had a “one-time sexual tryst” with Victim 1, which was consensual, in September or October 2006, after the victim noticed Warme outside a Third Street tavern and told him he looked “hot” in his police uniform.

“Defendant was then on duty. . . . Defendant drove in his assigned police car to this young woman’s home,” Daniels wrote in court papers. “After the sex act, defendant got dressed, put on his police uniform, said goodbye and left. Defendant returned to patrol duty in the City of Niagara Falls.”

The woman tried later to establish a relationship with Warme, but he rejected it, Daniels wrote.

• Victim 2 was a woman who met Warme in early 2006. She invited him to her apartment and performed oral sex on him “countless” times.

According to Daniels, Warme was assigned to investigate a complaint the woman filed against an ex-boyfriend in September 2007. Warme went to the woman’s apartment to investigate the complaint, and she again performed oral sex on him. “There was no force, no gun, no nothing; all defendant had to do was ask,” the defense attorney wrote.

In charges filed against Warme, federal prosecutors and federal agents give a much different version of Warmes’ encounters with the two women.

In those charges, Warme is alleged to have used his position in the Police Department to intimidate and scare the women into having sex with him. He is alleged to have raped Victim 1 and, while holding his hand on his police gun, forced Victim 2 to perform oral sex.

Assistant U. S. Attorney Anthony M. Bruce declined to comment in detail Monday about Daniels’ allegations concerning the two women. Bruce said prosecutors stand by their account of the events.

Bruce said Daniels has not responded to other allegations about Warme, including that he threatened other witnesses, sold and bought drugs, and gave the license plate numbers of undercover police cars to drug dealers.

Police arrested Warme after an investigation by his own department, the FBI, the U. S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives and the Drug Enforcement Administration. Bruce and Assistant U. S. Attorney Marie P. Grisanti are prosecuting the case.

Warme has been jailed without bail since his arrest. He is currently on administrative leave but is still being paid because of vacation and personal time he had accrued before his arrest, according to Mazur.

Mazur said Warme’s base salary is more than $40,000 a year. “I believe he has about 25 more accrued days left,” he said. “After that, we will be filing administrative charges against him. He could then be suspended without pay for 20 days. After that, he could be reinstated [or] possibly terminated.”

Mazur said the city takes the charges against Warme “very seriously” and will seek to terminate him from his city employment.