Rogue drug informant guilty

CLEVELAND (AP) — An informant who says he lied to ensnare innocent people in a federal drug investigation in Mansfield has pleaded guilty to state charges in a drug-related shooting in Cleveland last May.

Jerrell Bray, 34, of Cleveland, was sentenced Thursday to 11 years in prison on his guilty plea to felonious assault. In exchange for avoiding a possible 15-year term, he agreed to cooperate with an internal federal investigation into a cocaine bust in Mansfield.

More than half of the 26 people charged in the investigation in Mansfield, about 60 miles southwest of Cleveland, said they were set up by Bray and the officers who worked the case.

Of the 26 people indicted, four were acquitted at trial and one had charges dropped after spending 20 months in jail awaiting trial. Prosecutors are working to dismiss two other cases.

Within days of the shooting in May, Bray told lawyers that he helped set up innocent people in the cocaine investigation.

Bray worked as an informant for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, which is investigating the handling of Bray’s informant work.